9.12. Cameras and Recording Devices

| Chapter 9: Props: Food, Clothing, Money, Toys, Books, Electronics |

| 9.12. Cameras and Recording Devices

Recording what is going on, for later playing back or examination, is difficult because the range of situations is very complex. Exactly how much information should we store when we make a recording, and will this require problematically large tables? Will it be difficult even to do at all?

The usual approach is to record only basic details of events or situations. In If It Hadn't Been For... the tape recorder preserves only a few different sounds - footsteps, creaking, rustling - rather than capturing exactly the sound of every action taking place in earshot. In Claims Adjustment, we can take up to 36 Polaroid-style photographs, but each is described only by saying what it is a photo of. Thus we can have a photograph of a vase, or even a photograph of a photograph of a vase (because that too is a thing), but not a photograph of a still life in which several items have been gathered together by the player. That would ordinarily require too much storage.

A similar trick, though involving impromptu sculpture rather than photography, can be found in Originals. (The artist magically "manifests" these models rather than sculpting the conventional way in order to avoid the nuisance of carrying around raw materials - wax maquettes and so forth - which would clutter up the example.)

If we rely on indexed text, however, we can store arbitrary descriptions. Mirror, Mirror provides a perfect visual recorder: it remembers a room description exactly as the player saw it at the time.

Actor's Studio provides a video camera that records and time stamps all actions performed in its presence while it is set to record.

262
| Example If It Hadn't Been For... A sound recording device that records the noises made by player and non-player actions, then plays them back on demand. |
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311
| Example Claims Adjustment An instant camera that spits out photographs of anything the player chooses to take a picture of. |
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354
| Example Originals Allowing the player to create models of anything in the game world; parsing the name "model [thing]" or even just "[thing]" to refer to these newly-created models; asking "which do you mean, the model [thing] or the actual [thing]" when there is ambiguity. |
WI

406
| Example Mirror, Mirror The sorcerer's mirror can, when held up high, form an impression of its surroundings which it then preserves. |
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221
| Example Actor's Studio A video camera that records actions performed in its presence, and plays them back with time-stamps. |
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> Here we construct a video camera to track and play back actions: "The Actor's Studio" Section 1 - The Video Camera The video camera is a thing carried by the player. Table of Videotape
> recorded action | time stamp
> waiting | 9:00 AM
> with 25 blank rows.
Mode is a kind of value. The modes are idle, recording, and playing back. The video camera has a mode. The video camera is idle. Understand "play back" as playing back. Instead of switching on the camera, try tuning the camera to recording. Instead of switching off the camera, try tuning the camera to idle. The description of the video camera is "It is currently [mode]; its available settings are idle, recording, and playing back." Understand "set [camera] to [a mode]" as tuning it to. Tuning it to is an action applying to one thing and one mode. Instead of setting the camera to something: say "The available settings are idle, recording, and playing back." Check tuning it to: if the noun is not the camera, say "Only the video camera can be set to [the mode understood]." instead. Carry out tuning it to: now the mode of the noun is the mode understood. Report tuning it to: say "You set [the noun] to [mode understood]." After an actor doing something when the video camera is recording: if the current action is the action of tuning the video camera to recording, make no decision; if the number of blank rows in the Table of Videotape is greater than zero: choose a blank row in the Table of Videotape; now the recorded action entry is the current action; now the time stamp entry is the time of day; otherwise: now the video camera is idle; say "The video camera runs out of recording memory and switches off."; continue the action. Every turn when the video camera is playing back: say "On the camera screen, you see [run paragraph on]"; let starting playback be false; repeat through the Table of Videotape: if the recorded action entry is not waiting: now starting playback is true; say "[line break] -- [if the actor part of the recorded action entry is the player]you [end if][the recorded action entry], time stamped at [time stamp entry]"; blank out the whole row; if starting playback is false, say "only static."; otherwise say paragraph break. Section 2 - The Scenario The Actor's Studio is a room. Lucas is a man in the Actor's Studio. Persuasion rule: persuasion succeeds. The Studio contains an edible thing called a croissant. Test me with "set camera to recording / x lucas / lucas, take inventory / lucas, eat croissant / set camera to playing back / z". Notice that both Lucas' implied taking action (picking up the croissant) and his eating action are recorded on the same move.

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