Hello Nytrik.
Hi pal (as Haujobb's guys usually say).
Please tell us a bit about yourself and your current situation.
Ok, my real name is guillaume Nichols. I'm 24 since september 12th and i'm french, that was for the legal part. In fact i'm also known as Nytrik, a graphician of many groups.
I'm still a student in final year of MBA. I'm studying finance and banking in France but i've been also studying in the UK for 2 years (i got a BA of finance) and in Belgium for 6 months. I'm now working in a bank waiting for the university to take up again.
I can define myself as a living dead man going throught life without any purpose except admiring the end of each day as the end of something. Ends are usually more beautiful than beginnings.
So if you haven't got any purpose in your life, why do you live? maybe to define your own purpose?
Well i do not think so...
I think you can look for something to get the illusion that you are living. That's part of the system in which we are living but nothing really lead to something i do believe that we just try but we never achieve. So in this case i think the best solution is to do not to finish. We gotta enjoy the creation process in itself. Demos are interested in this sense coz they are useless. In a endless world the only thing that makes sense is the useless thing.
Purpose have to be forgotten to focus on the process. Why do i live... coz i'm used to this.... coz there is no truth out there (hehe) except deep and dark nothingnesss.
You don't sound like a funny guy.
I think that i could have been funny in an other world but i think u gotta be blind or mad to be funny in this world. At least i think i'm ironic.
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I notice we doesn't live in a paradise world but have you ever live some moments that
make you realize your life is good (or do you always look so nihilist ;-)?
Life is not bad or good... it is that all and we have to accept it. We have to live in our imperfection (not individually), that's what make life difficult : we can't stop it. |
How do you enjoy your life? (sex, drugs, rock & roll? :-)
Sex is not as good as it said to be, drugs are losing my mind which is the only thing that make sense in this world. Rock & roll is fine, i like ZZTOP ten years after and all that cool things (many Blues influenced music). My last good album is Manu Chao "clandestino". Blues is the deep expression of suffering. But it expresses that with dignity and pride.
Well, let's focus on your demoscene career now.
Tell us your history with computers & demoscene.
Let's go for serious stuff... i must say that i'm an old scener and it makes me a bit sad coz i keep wondering that one day i'll have to grow up and leave the scene.
I started in 1993, I think on ST. I used to be a stupid kid doing hacking. As i was really interested with drawing i started to use Neopaint on ST. I found an ad in a mag called "Tilt" in France about a demogroup that needed some gfx man. I thought it was easy so i started to work with them. The crew (Hydroxid) was not so good and i was really bad too.
So, in 1995 we changed for the Falcon it was really great to have so many color to works, "just like on the Amiga" we used to say ... The Falcon scene was small but really good. The best sceners were in there and it was a real pleasure.
I left the Falcon scene but i kept my machine to work with an Amiga crew called Syndrome. I've been leading the french scene for 2 years and Tenshu was (he is still) my master. Syndrome left for PC and i followed up.
The group spilt in 1997 before Wired 97 because of internal conflict. I left with Guille and Maf and we did "Coredump" on PC which ranked 3dr at wired 97. That was the first Cocoon productions.
We decided just after Wired to do something really big for next year, that was "Shad". We've been working 9 months on this one. I was in Belgium and Guille in France. All the demo was made at distance. Tenshu helped us a lot (he was working in the video game industy in the UK). Shad really impressed people but it was to slow and Guille was criticized a lot! so he wanted to take a revenge and we did "Shad 2" in 6 months, this one was considered as a revolutionary demo. We realeased it at Arf! party in france just to show that Cocoon is not commercial (i think we could have won The Party or whatever... unlike Gods).
ATC a new coder joined us. We did a small demo for LTP 3 and it ranked 2nd.
Cocoon is my major crew but i'm also working for Haujobb and Nomad from time to time.
I took part to many demos (i'll try to list them)
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In what groups are you in?
Cocoon, Nomad, Haujobb, Fuel (if it's still alive).
How did you come up with your handle/alias?
Hehe, that's a tricky question.
Well, when i was 15 i used to do hacking on ST. I had to get a handle to do so. So i decided to choose something impressive ane naughty to impress people in the scene. I first choose "midnight ghost" and when i came into Hydroxid i had to find an "artist hendel". "nytrik" was choosen because i found it agressive (i used to listen hard rock at that time, i had long dirty hair and so). At the beginning my handle was written "nitric" but the coder found it a bit common and advise me to change it for "nytrik". I really found it stupid now. But people know me as nytrik so i gotta keep it. I would have wanted something funny like "foofur" but i don't think the handle does really matter.
Which software do you use for drawing?
Mainly Photoshop 5 but i still use Gfx 2 and sometimes 3DSmax for some perspective effects.
Where do you get the inspiration from?
Inspiration comes from every day life.
I would say that my pic are inspired by the modern iconography. I'll try to explain that. The world in which we live have produced many symbols and signs : we are used to them and their meanings. They mean the same thing for every one. They are entity themselves and they have their own life. A chair is more than a chair in our mind : it's the chair on which we used to seet when we were a kid and so on... I want to free objects and signs from their meanings or at least to mix different ones in order to make the context explode. That's true for my pic called "Gel4". Do u got it?
Yeah, good work.
How long does it take to draw a good picture for you?
Depends on the inspiration and dead line from 5 hours to 40 hours (the pic "Zod4" i did for take over 99).
When drawing, do you have a perfect vision in your mind or do you draw more freely, by letting your image evolve in whatever direction you may feel like it?
Second solution , u explained it better than i would have done :)
:-) What are the most important aspects of making a great image (colors, composition, atmosphere, other aspects)?
I really think colors are really important part of the picture maybe the most important aspect of it. The basic drawing is important too.
What do you find the most difficult to draw?
I know it will sounds strange (coz a lot of graphician have methods for that) but i find clouds difficult. Skies are also difficult... bodies are not so difficult as they seem to be.
When you create an image, do you start by making an sketch on paper, or is everything done on the computer?
Photoshop is my best friend!
So, i deduct you start directly on the computer :-)
Do you use any special techniques? Please describe which drawing tools/techniques do you use mostly.
The technic is a bit difficult to describe in simple words but i'm mainly using Photoshop... if one of you wanna know something in detail just mail me... but remember one thing work is the key... technics can just help u a bit but it doesn't do everything for you.
Some of your pics include a B&W face with your signature. Is there a special meaning?
Not really, before that my signature was changing all the time so i wanted to do a kind of brand mark... just to say "this is me again".
Will this pic remplace your signature (like Prince and his "Love Symbol" :-)?
I hate Prince so I guess no... morelike a destruction symbol... not really sure about it but the signature is the most boring thing to do.
What does the scene mean to you, and which aspects do you like/dislike about it?
What i like is that i know a lot of cool and talented guys (old one mainly) from the scene and i really like working with them and sharing memories from the scene... what i hate is fresh guys thinking they are the best on earth and using scans or ripped code to access to the top.
Apart from Tenshu, have you other favourites artists?
Niko... i discovered Saffron recently and i must admit that this guy really rocks but my favourite gfx man is still Tenshu... (i just visited him last week in the UK, he is just the best i know).
You did a good job on Discloned. What is more easy to you, 2D or 3D?
I really think that "Discloned" is a good intro but not because of me, but thanks to Hellfire, he did a really great job on this. I simply did scenes and small textures. Generally speaking, i think 2D is much more easy than 3D and that it takes more time. And on the other hand, 3D gives me much more satisfaction coz it has a real impact on the whole demo.
Have you an idea about the necessary time for this work?
For "Discloned" it was very quick. At that time i used to work in a bank, and it was quite boring (my girlfriend was also on holidays) so it gave me time to work, i think all the work took me about 4 days full time. But have a look at "Shad 2", it's much better and i'm much more satisfied with it!
Are you generally satisfied with the result of your productions?
Did you put all the things you wanted in these projects?
Well, i must say that "Shad 1 and 2" are like my little kids. I put everything i wanted in it... that was the first time a coder made that possible for me. "Synaps 012" was done in hurry so it's a bit different...
What are your favourite demos/intros?
Mine! No, i'm joking... i really like the last stuffs from Unreal... i like also a demo from Digital Murder called "Jumpy" : it really rocks. I like also CNCD style but i must also say that i hate Blasphemy-like demo.
What are your projects for the nearest future?
Hehe, the future of Cocoon is very promising!
We are working on a project for TP9 and every one is really motivated... this time we'll try to tell a kind of story... for once... Hellfire is at the moment talking to me about something for TP... wait and see.
As far as i'm concerned things are getting more precised : i try to finish my doctorate even if i feel tired at the moment. And one day i'll leave the scene... maybe sooner than i think. I think i still need it so expect some more stuffs from me in the future .
Time to close, would you like to say hello to anyone?
Well, yes. To Tenshu my master, Falken for being so good, all Haujobb and Cocoon, to x barr (btw : fuck to gods), to ps, to Syndrome, to Unreal for being so good and cool and all the other i forgot.
So, thank you for your time!
Thanks to u.
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