I have often slagged off the limitations of technology in my time: I was one of those optimists who foolishly expected a future of 'leisure', alongside jetpacks, hovercars and plastic skyscapers. However, in this, my 50th year, I have to finally concede that I have access to many things I only dreamed about back in the 60s and 70s.
Firstly, it's worth pointing out the state of affairs regarding this subject in my youth: three TV channels; black-and-white, limited transmissions, the telly went off in the afternoon and fairly early at night [NO early morning TV.]
Radio was in mono, but clear enough. Photography was an expensive luxury, with mostly just rare portraits and rarer colour pictures, courtesy of a Canadian relative who had more advanced technology than we Brits. Vinyl records and stereo equipment never loomed large until I reached my teens: primitive recorded cassettes arrived in my early teens. We did have a phone in my house in 1967, which was pretty rare, but only because my dad had a building business---you had to wait 3 months to get a phone installed back then, and could only hire one.
It's been a long, long time in coming, but here are the benefits I finally admit are in a state of advanced capacity:
RECORDED SOUND at home:
I use a Yamaha amp DSP-AX75 for both music and film-watching. I have speakers all around the room, and have a truly dimensional soundscape that is wholly satisfactory ; in fact, when I visit some houses today, I can hardly hear their telly in comparison. It's only recently I have been able to afford proper hi-fi gear though, after doing my homework online. The quality doesn't have to get better than this....
I keep away from smaller gadgets like ipod though. They are not advanced enough to compete with a decent home system, and in fact I have never owned a mobile 'phone, ever. I simply don't need one, apart from the time I got lost coming off the 'plane in Spanish-speaking Venezuela, where I was 'lost' in a foreign nation for 15 minutes. Other than this, I have no intention in investing in hand-held gadgets, which can be very useful on occassion, but for me they are killing the art of meeting people in real-life.
I have tried downloading music online once, but it took all the fun out of it. I can get hold of CDS very reasonably priced however, usually online, and will stick to this, over downloaded music, which still seems to 'lack' something I can't adequately describe.
TELEVISION:
After decades in the doldrums, there is no denying that TV technology is coming on leaps-and-bounds, although I am still in the 2% category of those without a telly. High-definition is a welcome recent development that will likely become the 'norm' before long. This is miles ahead of the lo-fi stuff on offer when I was young-----it was fine at the time, however. Nevertheless, a recent visit to a relative revealed that much of the content today is pretty dire, and I saw a talent-show on prime-time ITV, depicting a contestant 'flatulating' a tune with a microphone-----there is some good stuff on offer, but there's a hell of a load of dross which is enough to put me off for the moment.
No matter, if I really want to see something, it's available on BBC-Iplayer etc, which does me. I can even get 'live' pictures on this, but I deliberately avoid this, I have actually went another route, and compiled a fairly large DVD library of my favourite films and shows, meaning I can avoid the dreaded 'adverts' which are polluting telly these days.
connected to telly:
PROJECTORS: I took a big gamble on this, which was uncharted waters that happily worked out very well indeed.......today, you can pick up a discounted line front-projector under 400 sovs, and this includes connection points to full hi-def capabilities, and attendant multichannel , sonic sound, at up to 7 seperate channels. Chuck in a subwoofer, and bob's yer uncle. Not all that prohibitively expensive as it once was, with even blu-ray films appearing at knockdown prices, and sometimes even cheaper than the original 'vanilla' DVD releases were originally. The quality here isn't far short of the theatrical experience, and that is no exaggeration. As long as I have access to this, I doubt if I'll be going back to 'normal' telly--------yes, projectors require expensive replacement bulbs, but this is still cheaper than 'consumer' tellies, which are simply not built to last and conk out fairly quickly.
PHOTOGRAPHY: massive strides here, I took as much pictures as I could in my youth, but I could never afford proper camera gear like 35 mm equipment. My older photos are lo-fi in comparison, although I was lucky enough to have a richer mate with a decent camera, so at least some quality stuff got recorded.......I just bought my first ever 'proper' SLR camera, and although there is a lot to learn here, the difference in quality is chalk and cheese. Even modern compact 'point-and-shoots' are something of a minor miracle, with as much photos as you can ever desire thanks to SD cards you can wipe and re-use.
Also connected:Hi-definition camcorders: these have tumbled in price, and the results can be very good indeed. Again, this stuff can be archived fairly cheaply onto disc, in a way that wasn't feasible in the old days---fantastic strides in technology at a truly affordable price....we never had it so good!
Digital Image Manipulation: Photoshop-like capabilities, obviously, which has revolutionized my approach to creating cartoons, in a way that was unimaginable when I was at school. I actually persevered with a free service called GIMP,---which does over 90% of what Photoshop does, if a good bit less user-friendly-------- which although difficult to grasp in the very early days, ---eventually yielded true benefits, and as a result, my drawings are taking on a polish that sees them looking more like the 'Disneyesque' imagery I dreamed of attaining for many years. Granted there is a steep learning curve with this stuff, but the advantages of digital manipulation have altered my finished cartoons in a way I could only dream of relatively recently.
the bottom line: I have reached 50, and am at last totally happy with the technology available to us today, which is affordable and accessible [if still a bit complicated in some respects]. Of course, this might just be down to me 'mellowing' in older age------now:
---where's that ASDA jetpack, or flying car?!
