[Minh-Tri Dang]

A visual exploration of retrofuturist design trends, our relationship with technology, and yesterday's world of tomorrow.  In my research, the typical aesthetic of retrofuturism is often found in 1930’s pulp fiction.  This is what I dub the golden era; after World War I and during the Great Depression people turned to science fiction to give them hope for the future.  The World’s Fair garnered mass attention and can be seen as a precursor to modern tech reveal events (Apple WWDC, Google IO, CES, E3, etc).  After World War II fiction became reality as the space race occurred culminating in 1969’s Apollo 11 moon landing.  This would usher in a silver age of retrofuturism from the 80’s and into the new millennium.  Home computing became commercially available, 3D graphics slowly emerged in gaming and movies, and the birth of the information superhighway took place during these three decades.  All the while and still to this day, speculators and design futurist are pondering on tomorrow.

 

I also explored techniques for designing emerging 3D graphics with limited technology from the same decades.  The 80’s utilized simple vector lines in perspective.  The 90’s had very limited polygonal models but also utilized clever shading in pre-rendered background images.  Models were also used as reference material for rasterized sprites in perspective.  It isn’t til the 2000’s where smooth textures could be properly rendered as well as more sophisticated animations that we take for granted today.