Mediums, Frames, and Symbols

The need to tell our stories

In a cave in France, paintings on the walls were created between 12,000 and 36,000 years ago. Created by people we’ll never know. People that didn’t have the technology or skill to write down their stories.

But they could paint the walls with their hands.

The collage of hands is haunting when you realize this was the best they could do to record their existence. Other paintings are of hunts that they wished to be remembered. Perhaps it was a combination of entertainment and education.

They were probably a visual that a storyteller would point to as they told the tale of the hunters tracking a great beast or some other unknown tale meant to inspire and warn the generation to come.

Storytelling as an oral tradition is still practiced today. From people trying to preserve traditional stories from their culture or a group of friends sharing a pizza and telling stories about their lives. The oral tradition is alive and well.

The issues with this first system were that stories couldn’t be recorded for future generations due to a lack of universal symbols and the lack of mobility meant that knowledge couldn’t travel.

The birth of writing

Pounding symbols into stone was the first way of recording portable stories. People took verbal symbols, translated them into written symbols, and etched them into stone with chisels and hammers.

With a set of symbols made into a writing system, the first issue was solved.

Now a person could read stories generations later without the original speaker as long as they shared the same language.

The stories of a culture could be recorded and transported from one location to another. But, stone tablets are, unsurprisingly, made of stone. They are heavy.

Yes, knowledge could move. However, making a copy would take a great deal of time and only a small amount of knowledge could be transported at a time.

The beauty of parchment

Parchment paper solved the weight issue. Now a chest full of scrolls and books could be moved around at the speed of a horse and wagon. A significant improvement from stone tablets.

Stories could now be transported from one place to another.

The new issue that developed was expense.

Every copy of a scroll or a book had to have a literate person sitting down for hours on end reading and rewriting each story by hand.

The next step was to tell stories to the masses.

Stories for the masses

Gutenberg improved on the printing press and moveable type that had been used in Asia a few centuries earlier. This invention marked a seismic shift in how stories and information were created and consumed.

Books were now so inexpensive to copy that stories could be translated and distributed to almost anyone in society.

Stories could be recorded and shared between cultures. A few centuries later, the Brothers Grimm were able to record traditional folktales and distribute them to the masses.

The tales from the cave were being preserved for future generations.

Mass media comes alive

The twentieth century brought us radio, film, television, and the internet which are all alive and well today. We have stories of all kinds available to us for a low-cost subscription.

Stories can now be told with moving pictures and recorded voices. The folk tales are not only distributed but retold with different characters and different settings. Look at every classic Disney animated film.

Radio, podcasts, and audiobooks prove that oral storytelling will never leave.

Creators, storytellers, and communicators of all kinds use the mediums available to tell stories with a global reach. We have come a long way since the caves.

Two new issues have been created though.

The tyranny of frames and the lack of interactivity.

Worlds of our imagination

Stories had always been passive.

The audience member sits in front of the medium and consumes a story.

That was until the arrival of video games.

Control was never something that was expected. But, now that audience member has a say in how a story unfolds. They can fight the bad guys and save the world.

We’ve become characters in virtual worlds.

And we aren’t alone.

We can explore virtual worlds with friends anywhere on Earth with a decent internet connection. The stories don’t need to be stored and carried.

With a press of a button and a bit of electricity, stories are everywhere.

Interactive media is so new that it’s still being refined and iterated on by professional studios and independent creators.

But, there are still frames.

Looking through a keyhole

Cave paintings, stone tablets, pieces of parchment, books, radio, film, television, and video games.

All are just frames looking at a fictional world.

We sit huddled at a closed door looking at wonders through the keyhole. Never able to walk through the door. We can see the story move in front of us, even interact with it, but the door of time remains locked.

The frames are not only a result of a camera lens but also the frames that exist in our language both verbal and written. The listener can hear the story of the hunt and see the paintings on the cave walls, but they can’t participate in the hunt.

We have been limited by frames since the dawn of humanity.

Opening the door

XR is built on the technology of the interactive medium of video games and inspired by traditional multimedia but provides something we’ve never had.

A way to open the door and step into a story.

Extended reality allows the audience member to move past symbols, frames, and linear stories altogether. They are able to simply exist in the world and explore the collective imagination of humanity.

Though still in its infancy, extended reality shows promise to give us storytelling that we’ve never experienced.

Instead of reading the Illiad, we’ll be able to storm the walls of Troy with the Greeks and fight alongside Achilles.

Instead of watching Die Hard, we’ll be able to be John McClane and take back Nakatomi Plaza from Hans Gruber.

Instead of watching Star Trek, we’ll be able to join Captain Picard and crew on the Enterprise to explore the galaxy.

Instead of hearing a story about the hunt, we’d join the hunters.

Extended reality won’t transport the stories to us, it’ll help us travel to the stories.

The implications for this move well beyond entertainment.

History, science, business, art, literature, philosophy, job training, and more all shed the constraints of frames and let us experience our world in a deeper way.

What comes next?

This was a high-level view of storytelling mediums to put extended reality into perspective.

It is a brand new medium that we have no reference for.

Frames have defined how we tell stories.

No matter how you consume a story, you were never there.

You hear about the hunt, how big the deer was, and how many dangers were faced, but you didn’t go.

You had to rely on language and visuals to bring you there.

The beginning, middle, and end have been the best we can do.

In the near future, you’ll be able to step into another life.

And someone will be able to step into yours.

We’ll simply know each other.

A final note

If you enjoyed this, then please share this newsletter with others interested in extended reality.

Thank you for your time!

Sean