Effect of New Media Technologies on Media Culture and Peoples Everyday Life- 3D Printer - Report Example

Research report Name: Tutor: Course: Date: Table of Contents 1.0 Introduction 3 1.1 Research questions 3 1.2 New media technologies 3 1.3 Revolution of new media technologies 4 1.4 3D printing and effect on media culture: Approaches 5 1.4.1 3D technology in cinema 5 1.4.2 3D technology in media games 7 1.5 New media influence on media culture and people’s daily lives 8 1.6 Conclusion 10 Annotated Bibliography 12 Other important sites 15 Topic: Effect of New Media Technologies on media culture and people’s everyday life. A case of 3D printer 1.0 Introduction People have been affected by new media in the way they think, communicate, learn, and behave (Manovich, 2011). Not only digital technology heralded the emergence of art making and live forms but also witnessed increase in preventative media art and interaction between technologies and people. Current studies obtain that media technologies are directing people to a brand new time and improvement in quality of life. By living with media technologies, people become more effective and creative (Bolter & Grusin, 1999). Today, there are a number of new print media technologies. One of them is the 3D printer which has demonstrated that it can be used to form art media and make life interesting. Print technology is a process that reproduces images and texts. Through this technology, people have the ability to share information and spread knowledge at a global level (Lister, et al. 2009). The development of 3D technology has become tridimensional and digital hence changing media culture to new times. 1.1 Research questions 1. What is new media technology and how does it present itself? 2. How has new media technologies developed from previous media technology products? 3. What is 3D printing technology and how has it affected the media culture? 4. How new media technologies impacted today has’s media culture and peoples’ daily lives? 1.2 New media technologies Manovich (2001) defines ‘New media’ as the use of computers for exhibition and distribution instead of production. This means that text distributed on paper is not considered as new media but those distributed in electronic books and websites are treated as new media. The medium to transmit new media such as computer multimedia, 3D printers, websites, internet and virtual reality are ‘new media technologies’. New media technologies have the potential of changing the existing cultural languages (Lister, et al. 2009). The revolution in technology from the fourteen century printing press to nineteenth century photography up to the present day 3D printer, it became a cultural revolution to modern computer-mediated forms of communication, distribution and production (Bolter & Grusin, 1999). Just as the printing press signified cultural communication in distribution of new media, and photography in communicating still images, new media technologies are communication distribution, storage, manipulation and acquisition. This means the new media technologies, in terms of cultural communication, affects spatial constructions, sound, moving images, still images and texts (Manovich, 2011). In essence, new media technologies have translated all the numerical data to be accessible through computers in form of computer data. New media now exist in form of text, spaces, shapes, sounds, moving images and graphics (Manovich, 2001). Some new media objects obey certain principles such as cultural transcoding, variability, automation, modularity and numerical representation. Media identity has changed more dramatically. “…as new media objects manifest more and more, computerization of culture is getting deeper and deeper into the layers of culture” Manovich, (2011, p. 49). Functioning of modern mass societies has been attributed to the development of computing machines and media machines (Lister, et al. 2009). For example, people are now able to disseminate same texts, sounds and images to millions of people in order to share similar ideological beliefs. Some of the documents that people shared were police records, medical records, employment records, and birth records. Moreover, data processing and mass media in modern mass society are complementary technologies developing side by side and appearing together to make society more possible (Murphey, 2013). 1.3 Revolution of new media technologies The fourteenth century printing press exploited media distribution before the emergences of photography in 1830s to engender the era of still images (Manovich, 2011). In 1839, Louis Daguerre from Paris pioneered a new reproduction process that captured the exterior environment in what came to be known as daguerreotype architecture and landscapes (Lister, et al. 2009). Two years later, the new media machine could take pictures fit for portrait galleries. Earlier in 1833, Charles Babbage invented the Analytical Engine that closely resembled the modern day digital computer. It utilized punch card technology and could perform mathematical operations and rational decision making just at the 1800 Jacquard looms (Lister, et al. 2009). The Analytical Engine was not only synthesizing images but also processing numbers. The nineteenth and early twentieth century’s witnessed the development of calculators, and electrical and mechanical tabulators (Reichardt, O 2014). The efficiency and speed in 1890s became a preference but more important was modern media that allowed storage of materials in text, sound, and image sequences. In late 1890s, film industry began when scenes grew longer, editing of samples, multiplication of copies and staging realities before the camera (Bolter & Grusin, 1999). Movie audiences were thrilled by motion film images as they escaped the realities of data processing systems and own sampling. For example, as a subject of modern society, people thronged movie theatres as it had become a dark relaxation chamber and a routine survival technique. It was not until 1936 that a British mathematician Alan Turing came up with Universal Turing Machine that changed the film industry alongside the works of Konrad Zuse of Germany using binary codes (Manovich, 2011). In 1970s, the emergence of 3D printing conceptualized space and form in art as shall be discussed in the next sub topic. 1.4 3D printing and effect on media culture: Approaches 1.4.1 3D technology in cinema 3D printing is one of the technologies developed in 1980s that provides prototyping and molding in product design. The knowledge and experience in 3D printers is as important step in design and manufacturing (Lupton, 2014). There are a number of 3D printing methods such as laser sintering, material extrusion and inkjet. The most well known 3D printing is additive 3D printing because the printer lays down successive materials layers, mainly plastic, in a way that inkjet printers deploys ink drops to form 3D objects. Subtractive 3D printing is another type in which the printer creates a 3D object by removing excess from the block. Modern companies using high-quality 3D printers offer customized 3D software, hardware, learning materials and print materials for different user groups (Manovich, 2001). The 3D space in 1990s was embedded alongside other media elements such as sound, digital video, photographs and graphics (Lister, et al. 2009). This became a cultural convention when 3D computer graphics technology used the mobile camera in computer movie making, flight simulation and computer-aided design. Indeed, 3D created a cultural interface drawn on older cultural forms of nineteenth century entertainment, magic lantern shows and cinema. Cinema uses mobile virtual camera interfaced with screen-based 3D interactive environments in order to occupy different parts of space. By using photorealistic 3D computer graphics, other users interacting with virtual characters, most likely affect the course of narrative events (Manovich, 2001). 3D technology is not only being taken up by industrial manufacturing and distribution of goods but also in a number of intriguing ways being taken up by artists, makers and designers. 3D spaces in rectangular frames allow for navigation using mobile point of view such as search/replace, copy/paste, parameters, variables and hierarchical menus (Lister, et al. 2009). They have helped shape the three traditions of cinema, the printed word and human-computer interface which are essential characteristics of cultural interfaces. Given these traditions, human experiences become structured in the way information is accessed since space and time is correlated. The audio-visual narrative in the 3D space offer ways of organizing particular types of data given that they represent distinct cultural traditions in which human memory and experience are recorded (Ratto & Ree, 2012). This implies that 3D printing technologies are mechanisms for social and cultural exchange of information, and communication through discrete objects in hypermedia, databases and hierarchical file system. Cinema and the printed word are also interfaces with grammar of actions, metaphors offering specific physical interfaces (Manovich, 2001). For example, a magazine or a book is solid objects with separate pages but actions involve linear perusal of pages and marking individual pages. However, with cinema, the virtual 3D space represents the physical interface of an architectural arrangement in a movie theatre. New media technologies especially 3D printing has shaped the language of cultural interfaces in the way it has interfaced cinema, human-computer interfaces and the printed word (Kücklich, 2004). Cinema’s influence on cultural interfaces was originally developed in 1980s and 1990s in computer movie making, flight simulators and computer-aided designs (Manovich, 2001). Represented in three dimensions, the aspect of computer culture literally meant the structure of computer network, statistical data, and design of new molecules, architectural sites and results of a physical simulation. Moreover, computer culture is spatializing all the experiences and representations when subjected to the grammar of data access by the camera (Weiser, 2008). For example, actions such as track, pan, tilt and zoom are operations that can be used to enable the user interact with bodies, objects, models and data spaces. Directed by physical realities, the physical body of a virtualized camera is interfaced with all the information and media types apart from the 3D space. The presence of zoom, track and dolly buttons in cinematic vision informed the 3D scenes and a development from the print tradition. 3D images especially in cinema represents reality objectified in its rectangular framing. In 1992, artists such as Tamas Waliczky in the film ‘The Garden’ developed custom-made 3D software in partnership with computer programmers to objectify a small child that the world had not thought about (Manovich, 2001). Indeed, based on Waliczky’s films, the world and camera are made into a whole object. Cinema being the cultural form of the twentieth century, using interactive visual worlds engenders a logical succession of cinema which is more into narrative and interaction in the twenty-first century art (Ratto & Ree, 2012). 1.4.2 3D technology in media games Analysis of the 3D printer’s black box depicts playfulness at digital and physical level. Open source design and the modularity of hardware and software invites modification while the hybridity of digital hacking in play perspective in open source environments extends playful activities into the realm of playful nature (Smale, 2014). 3D printer is broken into modules through hardware design and open source software so that the modularity of its printing enables the user to gain more knowledge on its technology. In essence, 3D printer hacking is part of a general development in ludification of culture (Weiser, 2008). The character of new media from the involvement of media culture has been altered since material aspects are considered in 3D printing when analyzing modification of technology, change and use (Bolter & Grusin, 1999). Knowledge communities are being created by media-savvy consumers, using playful media, and are important participants. “…two characteristics describe affordance – object specificity or technology and material aspects when imposed through the design” Schafer (2011, p. 19) When media phenomena are seen from the panorama of play, new perspectives on producer and user relationships become evident (Bruijn, 2010). For example, the capability of play has its occurrence provided in four levels; a player accepting rules, a cheater choosing to break or follow rules, a modder creating new situations within the framework of games, and the programmer fundamentally altering the game or designing new ones completely (Smale, 2014). 3D printing development enables the programmer and the modder to become players with higher notion of control over the machine. As the user gains more control of the machine, they become more knowledgeable and autonomous. This shows that at meso-level, 3D printing technology, producers and hackers become important actors in a complex process (Manovich, 2001). In experimental production of 3D printing, users are motivated by learning ins and outs of a machine, pleasures of tinkering and curiosity of knowing (Bruijn, 2010). They are also driven by ideologies that the work of new media benefits society. Hippel (2005, p.61) acknowledges that 3D printing has intellectual stimulation, provides greater knowledge and creative experience. This means that to participate in this technology is an informal way or building or tinkering. 3D printing has advanced the culture of play and opened up the entire spectrum of media objects to be used in games. For example, companies such as Ultimaker have innovated technology by using a large community of user to ‘hack’ hardware and software in 3D printers. The subjective nature of the experiences, emotional responses in various situations and perceptions are being shaped by new media (Smale, 2014). 1.5 New media influence on media culture and people’s daily lives As discussed above, the influence of 3D printer on media culture explores the heights of cinema and media games. The current 3D space is objectified in gaming models such as those shown in Xbox or Play station 4. 3D printer as one of the most prolific new media technologies has brought both benefits and grappling challenges (Ratto & Ree, 2012). People love art and creative game models but community cohesion, accidental meetings and social interactions are gradually being eroded. “Interaction among people will reduce, with fewer conversations and incidental chats critical in building strong communities” Reichardt (2014, p.1) Although 3D printing may not bring noticeable difference, a variety of them add up to significantly atomized communities. With the growth in home 3D printing, users are going online to obtained designed objects, personalize the design, then purchase the tailor made design before downloading to the printer (Wirth, 2014). Real time animated 3D characters move in arbitrary manner around the space with the space itself changing during the game. For example, a player returning from a visited area finds objects left earlier. Consequently, the switch makes virtual worlds cinematic and integrates characters visually into their environments (Murphey, 2013). Online virtual worlds such as Nintendo have dedicated four buttons in their joypad N64 to control view of action. New media technologies reunite material reality and perception into ontology of the virtual world by treating cinema as a toolbox extolling computer culture. Ratto and Ree (2012, p. 12) notes that in business, 3D printing has been christened the ‘third industrial revolution’ from the way it has impacted manufacturing and distribution of goods full cycle. However, it is essential to understand how new technologies in general is impacting on relationships between people (Wirth, 2014). Web 2 technologies such as Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, email and Google among others have combined with 3D printing technology to communicate human perceptions, experiences, form and feelings in a more humanistic manner. Innovative brands employing new media technologies are helping people to connect and improve their own performance (Bolter & Grusin, 1999). It is no longer enough to connect people using messages alone but behavior. Behavior shapes interaction, engagement and use and that technology can help open up the reading experience (Lister, et al. 2009). Humans have inhabited both ancient oral culture and current print culture but more important is the sense of closure and feeling of finality or reaching a state of completion. From the printing press of Johannes Gutenberg in circa 1440 to the current 3D printers, people are getting fashioned to reading experiences as ancient shared scrolls through dynamic personalized content, group discussions and shared notes. 3D printing in business has accelerated innovation and experiences in manufacturing (Lipson & Kurman, 2013). For example, Ricoh Rapid Fabs has researched into 3D printer innovations especially in design and manufacturing. Customers are able to experience 3D printing products and take advantage of own data. According to Smale (2014) roles of 3D printing in society follows five trends; novels spaces for fabrication, citizen empowerment, the evolving consumer, new conceptions of labor, and unlocking latent entrepreneurship. Under novel spaces for fabrication, network forums and online virtual communities are being established to make 3D printing more interactive, entrepreneurial, streamlined and accessible. For example, Ponoko which began as a laser cutting hub has expanded to 3D printing with resemblance to social network and laser machine shop. Thousands of makers are now sharing a virtual version of collective studio, a typology highly regarded in design, art and craft spheres (Kücklich, 2004). Digital fabrication technologies are also enabling participation and inclusion. Mass customization has allowed users to define attributes like shape, porosity, eccentricity and proportion in a manner that imbues an object with a personal meaning. In citizen empowerment, digital media is providing a means of sharing experiences with others through dissemination and receipt of resources (Manovich, 2011). People have fun in making own toys, community affiliation, expression of aesthetic taste, visualizing problems that prove difficult in virtual pictures and extending disparate structures, systems and forms. People are being empowered to fabricate things serving as viable options to buying manufactured consumer goods. In a broader framework of accounting for labor, 3D object printing considers the entire sphere of effort exerted in object making and distributed over time and space (Lipson & Kurman, 2013). Finally, ‘amateur inventions’ originate from innovative ideas but it is only reasonable if transformed from mere conceptual designs to market realities. 1.6 Conclusion New media technologies affirm ways in which people communicate, live, share information and transform innovative ideas. New media has witnessed the emergence of 3D printing in which text, images, and sound have been integrated into space and time to extol human experiences and imagination. Besides use in medicine and industrial manufacturing, 3D printing has critical importance in design, art and craft. Movie theatres and gaming technology are some of the media cultures that have witnessed that impact of new media technologies. From still images to computer-aided design and multi-dimensional objects, people are able to visualize their world and increase their imaginative abilities and experiences. By visualizing reality, people are able to solve problems by simply connecting structures, systems and art forms. Annotated Bibliography Bolter, JD & Grusin, R 1999, Remediation: Understanding New Media, Camridge, Mass.: The MIT Press, 19. Further information to understand new media and how people lives have improved. Supports the view of Manovich (2011) and Smale (2014) in discussing cinema, photography and human-computer interface. Bruijn, E 2010, On the Viability of the Open Source Development model for the Design of Physical Objects: Lessons Learned From the RepRap Project. Tilburg University, The Netherlands, 2010. Accessed 28 February, 2014.http://thesis.erikdebruijn.nl/master/MScThesis-ErikDeBruijn-2010.pdf. New perspectives on producer and user relationships of new media technologies and elaborated and evidenced. Hippel, E 2005, Democratizing Innovation. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2005. 3D printing has been cited as intellectual stimulation, provides greater knowledge and creative experience. This means that to participate in this technology is an informal way or building or tinkering. Kücklich, J 2004, Play and Playability as Key Concepts in New Media Studies. Dublin City University. Dublin. Supports the works of Smale (2004) on playability and new media. Provides aviarous concepts in new media such as customizable, participatory, modular and systemic approaches. Lipson, H & Kurman, M 2013, Fabricated: The New World of 3D Printing. Indianapolis: John Wiley and Sons, 2013. Elaborates understanding of 3D models and explains its processes and applications Lister, M Dovey, J Giddings, S Grant, I & Kelly, K 2009, New Media: a Critical Introduction. Second ed., London: Routledge. New media is approached as Web 2 technologies and historical perspective of the printing press, photography and finally the 3D printer. Lupton, D 2014, Towards a sociology of 3D printing, November 24, 2014. https://simplysociology.wordpress.com/tag/3d-printing/ More explanations on the sociology of 3D printing on how 3D printing has affected society in the context of designers, artists and manufacturers. Writer accepts the increasing use of 3D printers in the households and the underlying legal and environmental issues. Manovich, L 2001, The Language of New Media, 1st ed. MIT press: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Explores new media in terms of virtual reality, computer games, computer multimedia, websites and internet. Features cinema in films and exploits of 3D animations in print, sound and image compositions. How new media became new is explored as well as the principles of new media such as numerical representation, modularity, automation, variability and transcoding. Important areas are the interfaces and languages of cultural interfaces. Murphey, S 2013, Will 3D printers save the world? March 25, 2013. http://makezine.com/2013/03/25/will-3d-printers-save-the-world/ The notion of entrepreneurship is incorporated in terms of innovation and creativity of 3D printers. Discussion is laid as to how the printer will save lives, improve economy and reconcile cultural differences. Ratto, M & Ree, R 2012, Materializing information: 3D printing and social change, First Monday, Vol. 17, no.7, pp. 1-13. http://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/3968/3273 New media technologies are explored to the extent of social transformative technology as used by designers and architects. From the results of an environmental scan, key trends have been identified which are novel spaces of fabrication, citizen empowerment, evolving consumer, and unlocking of latent entrepreneurship. Reichardt, O 2014, 3D printing and its impact on society, November 23, 2014. https://www.thersa.org/discover/publications-and-articles/rsa-blogs/2014/01/3d-printing-and-its-impact-on-society/ Focus on the realities of new media technologies especially the 3D printer. Asks the key question what mass 3D printer is changing society and accepts that it is difficult to find and confiscate a computer file than a physical object. Schäfer, MT 2011, Bastard Culture! How User Participation Transforms Cultural Production. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. Defines the term ‘media culture’ and how new media has transformed the cultural practice in art and design. Employs technological perspective to explore the role of media and culture in involving communities. Smale, S 2014, Building material: exploring playfulness of 3D printers. Digital Games Research Association, Vol. 1, no.3, pp. 5-15. http://todigra.org/index.php/todigra/article/view/21/32 Explores the concept of 3D printers but with a bias on the gaming. Key traditions include ‘playful printer, playful practice’. The interdependence between affordance, design and appropriation. Weiser, F L 2008, The new media technologies: overview and research. The new media technologies: overview and research framework, /, 28. Provides an overview and broad understanding of new media technologies and how it has changed the media culture. Important events are the revolution from the printing press to the 3D printer. Web 2 technologies also highlighted as contributing to the culture and art of a nation. Evaluating the Cultural Quality of New Media: Towards an Integrated Philosophy of Human-Media Wirth, K 2014, Ricoh officially launches 3D printing business, two new rapid fab facilities. September 22, 2014. http://wirthconsulting.org/2014/09/22/ricoh-officially-launches-3d-printing-business-two-new-rapid-fab-facilities/ Perspectives of 3D printing as used in manufacturing is explored in customer point of view and advantages of embracing the 3D technology. It also explores some of the methods such as additive 3D and subtractive 3D printing. Other important sites Relations | 3TU. 2015. Evaluating the Cultural Quality of New Media: Towards an Integrated Philosophy of Human-Media Relations | 3TU. [ONLINE] Available at:http://ethicsandtechnology.eu/projects/evaluating_the_cultural_quality_of_new_media_towards_an_integrated_philosophy_of_human_media_relations/. [Accessed 20 April 2015]. 3D Printing Influence Study | Appinions Data Journalism.2015. 3D Printing Influence Study | Appinions Data Journalism. [ONLINE] Available at:http://dj.appinions.com/3d-printing-september-2014/. [Accessed 19 April 2015]. Ricoh Launches 3D Printing Related Business. 2015. Ricoh Launches 3D Printing Related Business. [ONLINE] Available at:http://www.ricoh.com.au/Ricoh-Launches-3D-Printing-Related-Business. [Accessed 20 April 2015]. Provides a more realistic application of 3D printing in terms of its innovativeness and manufacturing. The link defines 3D printing and types of 3D printers. It also explores the facilities and rich experience in the use of 3D printing especially on additive 3D printing and others. What Is New Media Technology? (with pictures). 2015. What Is New Media Technology? (with pictures). [ONLINE] Available at:http://www.wisegeek.org/what-is-new-media-technology.htm. [Accessed 19 April 2015]. Read More

Just as the printing press signified cultural communication in distribution of new media, and photography in communicating still images, new media technologies are communication distribution, storage, manipulation and acquisition. This means the new media technologies, in terms of cultural communication, affects spatial constructions, sound, moving images, still images and texts (Manovich, 2011). In essence, new media technologies have translated all the numerical data to be accessible through computers in form of computer data.

New media now exist in form of text, spaces, shapes, sounds, moving images and graphics (Manovich, 2001). Some new media objects obey certain principles such as cultural transcoding, variability, automation, modularity and numerical representation. Media identity has changed more dramatically. “…as new media objects manifest more and more, computerization of culture is getting deeper and deeper into the layers of culture” Manovich, (2011, p. 49). Functioning of modern mass societies has been attributed to the development of computing machines and media machines (Lister, et al. 2009). For example, people are now able to disseminate same texts, sounds and images to millions of people in order to share similar ideological beliefs.

Some of the documents that people shared were police records, medical records, employment records, and birth records. Moreover, data processing and mass media in modern mass society are complementary technologies developing side by side and appearing together to make society more possible (Murphey, 2013). 1.3 Revolution of new media technologies The fourteenth century printing press exploited media distribution before the emergences of photography in 1830s to engender the era of still images (Manovich, 2011).

In 1839, Louis Daguerre from Paris pioneered a new reproduction process that captured the exterior environment in what came to be known as daguerreotype architecture and landscapes (Lister, et al. 2009). Two years later, the new media machine could take pictures fit for portrait galleries. Earlier in 1833, Charles Babbage invented the Analytical Engine that closely resembled the modern day digital computer. It utilized punch card technology and could perform mathematical operations and rational decision making just at the 1800 Jacquard looms (Lister, et al. 2009). The Analytical Engine was not only synthesizing images but also processing numbers.

The nineteenth and early twentieth century’s witnessed the development of calculators, and electrical and mechanical tabulators (Reichardt, O 2014). The efficiency and speed in 1890s became a preference but more important was modern media that allowed storage of materials in text, sound, and image sequences. In late 1890s, film industry began when scenes grew longer, editing of samples, multiplication of copies and staging realities before the camera (Bolter & Grusin, 1999). Movie audiences were thrilled by motion film images as they escaped the realities of data processing systems and own sampling.

For example, as a subject of modern society, people thronged movie theatres as it had become a dark relaxation chamber and a routine survival technique. It was not until 1936 that a British mathematician Alan Turing came up with Universal Turing Machine that changed the film industry alongside the works of Konrad Zuse of Germany using binary codes (Manovich, 2011). In 1970s, the emergence of 3D printing conceptualized space and form in art as shall be discussed in the next sub topic. 1.4 3D printing and effect on media culture: Approaches 1.4.1 3D technology in cinema 3D printing is one of the technologies developed in 1980s that provides prototyping and molding in product design.

The knowledge and experience in 3D printers is as important step in design and manufacturing (Lupton, 2014). There are a number of 3D printing methods such as laser sintering, material extrusion and inkjet. The most well known 3D printing is additive 3D printing because the printer lays down successive materials layers, mainly plastic, in a way that inkjet printers deploys ink drops to form 3D objects.

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