You are here because you've made a difference in ACiD. You were (and are) an important and influential part of history, period.
A monumentally final chapter in the ACiD artpack legacy is upon us as we rapidly approach the release our landmark 100th ACiD Acquisition Update. It's not for me to say what happens afterwards, but this will be *my* final release with ACiD.
Please accept my apologies for the impersonal vibe of a FAQ / form-letter type document, which has that feel by design. With the help of a few friends, I'm doing everything possible to notify everyone by email personally; unfortunately, I can't afford to contact the 700+ ACiD affiliates each by way of voice, my red box stopped working. ;-)
Along with the release of ACiD-100 are several other ACiD- related events and projects which are of equally great importance to me. Please read below to find out how you can get involved...
RaD Man / ACiD Founder
Q: Will ANSI be allowed in ACID-100?
A: Yes.
Q: What are ACiD's plans for ACID-100?
A: Please bear with me, as this question warrants a fairly lengthy answer:
Phase 1: (9/1/2002-6/30/2003)
The first phase of ACiD-100 is trying to contact each and every ACiD member ever documented to give them notification that there will be a 100th pack. Some people after they quit "the scene" did so and never looked back, and alot of people are really excited to find out that this group is still going strong. We are making efforts to contact EVERY member, even those who did not create art; coordinators, telecom- couriers, sysops, etc.
A master memberlist database was created in August 2002 and completed in September 2003 detailing every unique member (duplicates and AKAs removed) listing each member from 1990-2003. The total number was 705. Obviously, there is no way we are going to find everyone; we simply do not have the resources or man power. However, we have successfully located all but one of the five original members of the group, several senior staff from the past, almost every advisor, and many more prominent people who come to mind when you think "ACiD".
Our resources will stop dedicating time to the outreach phase of the ACiD-100 project at the end of June 2003 in order to focus on other areas of production, but this document will still stand. Please feel free to pass this document along or share this URL with other ACiD members from the past who might be interested.
I've accepted that not everyone will receive a notification of this final release, but anticipate that we will at least be able to successfully contact the majority of the group, giving as many people as possible an opportunity to volunteer to contribute in some shape or form...
Phase 2: (6/30/2003-10/31/2003)
The second phase of ACiD-100 is the longest "Call for Art" in the history of the group. For four months we will be accepting artwork in several mediums. Every form of art will be considered for this special release. There is some manditory criteria that a submission must meet, though, in order to be taken in to consideration:
General Requirements:
Many ANSI artists have gone on to become very successful artists in different ways. From professional musicians to computer graphic animators for major Hollywood motion pictures to virtually every aspect of the computer gaming industry, and so on. Anything conceivable is possible for this pack.
We will be accepting files in the formats below, with the following format-specific requirements (as mentioned in ACiD-100 News Issue #3):
Textmode/BBS graphics:
Please do not draw on the 80th column as this will FUBAR the display of your artwork on a good number of viewers. If you will be including ANSImation, please limit yourself to a display area of 79x23 (out of 80x25).
TheDraw 4.6x or ACiDDraw 1.25r are the recommended editors for this format.
Please specify what character set and aspect ratio you used on the first page of your artwork; i.e. "View in 80x50 mode" or "View with Amiga Topaz font". Also avoid drawing on the 80th column at all costs to maximize viewer compatibility.
ACiDDraw or Empathy 0.99 is recommended for this medium.
XBIN is preferred over BIN, but please pre-SAUCE including the dimensions of the image when using this format.
ACiDDraw is recommended for this medium.
This is the choice medium for all text graphics unless of course you are going to be utilizing animation. XBIN guarantees the viewer will see the exact same character set used by the artist.
Empathy 0.99 for DOS or PabloDraw for Windows are the recommended editors for this format.
Some editors vary in the way they calculate how certain functions of RIP should be handled such as bezier curves. Believe it or not, this can lead to disastrous problems when it comes to the displaying of RIP over various terminal programs and viewers.
For this reason, we only recommend our own de facto standard editor, Tombstone Artist 2.00.
High-resolution graphics:
Only three still image formats are being allowed in ACiD-100, and the first choice is PNG. PNG is strongly preferred over all others due to being free of patents and licensing issues, plus it's ability to achieve lossless compression with TrueColor support.
One of the oldest image formats still in use today, GIF will be allowed.
This format will be accepted but PNG is strongly suggested as an alternative over JPEG.
Standard video-mode resolutions are preferred but not required. Suggested image sizes are: 320x200 (MCGA), 640x480 (VGA), 800x600 (SVGA), 1024x768 (XGA), 1280x1024 (SXGA), and 1600x1200 (UXGA).
Animation/Demos:
Demos and multimedia video animations will be accepted.
Intros and demos need to be compatible with Windows XP with a standard 3D graphics card such as an ATI Radeon or nVidia GeForce. The user should be able to press Escape to quit at any time.
HTML, FlashMX, Shockwave Director MX and Java demos will be accepted. Please ensure compatibility with Internet Explorer 6.x and Netscape 7.x browsers. All files must be called locally and must not make calls or load from files on a remote site.
MPEG and MPEG-2 are the only accepted formats for digital video. Standard resolutions and framerates are preferred. Please convert AVI, DivX, QuickTime, etc., to one of these formats.
Music, Speech and Audio:
The following mod formats will be accepted: MOD, 669, S3M, XM and IT.
MP3 and OGG will be accepted. Please encode at a bitrate of either 192kbps/44khz or 192kbps/48khz. VBR is allowed.
Something else:
We are open to unique ideas -- if you'd like to release something we haven't covered here... Just ask!
"...And when is the deadline?"
The drop dead date to turn in something for this project is October 31st, 2003.
Phase 3: (11/1/2003-12/1/2003)
The final phase, Phase 3 of this project involves digestion, quality inspection, SAUCE descriptions, final touch-ups, editorializing, all that sort of thing you'd associate with packaging a normal ACiD artpack. The only difference is this one will have been over a year in the making.
In addition to ACiD-100, there is another project just as large which we will be working on in parallel, which leads me to...
My biggest concern is documenting history. I'm much more interested in someone submitting an article for The Product 3 than attempting to boot up their old PC in an attempt to crank out an ANSI like they used to.
What types of articles are we looking for? Primarily, I am seeking out introspective autobiographical natured ones; detailing your start in BBS'ing (or the 'net, if that's the case), how you first found out about the "underground" scene which you eventually became affiliated with, what your motives were in joining ACiD (ego, fame, the cash money and women?), how you joined ACiD (did you apply, were you recruited, did you merge in from another group?), who you met along your journey, who your influences were, who you looked up to, how your activities in the scene impacted your life after you quit, what you're doing now for a living, what schools you attended, et cetera. The list really goes on forever, write whatever comes to mind.
Documenting how you saw the scene from your eyes is an infinite number times more important to me than dusting off an old ANSI editor in an effort to see if you've still "got the touch".
What types of articles are we looking for?
Background history on The Product:
The first issue of The Product electronic magazine was released just days apart from our first "ACiD Acquisition Update" (which in turn spurned the entire monthly artpack trend amongst ANSI groups). The second issue was released with our monumental release of ACiD-50, our 50th Acquisition Update. We thought it was only fitting to release our third and final issue of The Product concurrent with our 100th and final pack.
Q: Will there ever be another ACiDcon?
A: Yes. Sort of...
However, what I'm planning will not be held in the United States. At the time of this writing, over 75% of our hirez division resides somewhere in Europe or Russia.
We are planning to band together one more time at the worlds most spectacular demoparty; Assembly 2004 which is held each August in the heart of Helsinki, Finland.
We carefully considered having our own private ACiD event, renting out a hall for the day (or weekend). The liabilities involved and planning necessary required more time than I had available, and more money than I wanted to spend or attempt to raise. It made much more sense to meet at a place where the majority of ACiD members could easily travel to, not to mention where we would be surrounded by other people with similar interests (coding, graphics, music). Assembly is easily the largest and most recognized demoparty amongst all scenes. The choice to hold a global-scale ACiD gathering there was obviously simple.
While we realize not all 700+ former and present ACiD members will be able to travel all the way to Finland, we wanted everyone to at least know they're invited to join us for this massive get-together. The fact that there are competitions that could potentially apply to almost every past and present ACiD member is just an added benefit. :)
RaD Man / ACiD Founder
Unauthorized use of graphics or HTML prohibited. To contact the author, send e-mail to: ragnarok@acid.org.
