Information Landscapes at TED5 
In 1993, Silicon Graphics—a leading producer of high performance computer graphics hardware and software—loaned the Visible Language Workshop a computer running their Reality Engine, which allowed Muriel Cooper and her team to experiment with type in motion. With a content limit of a few hundred words and a frame rate of 30 frames per second, the Reality Engine had a lower capacity than many of today’s smartphones. But at the time, it allowed for a whole new concept of dynamic text as well as a fundamental reconfiguration of the space of graphic design.

In 1994, Cooper presented Information Landscapes at the TED5 Conference in Monterey, California. This video offered a radical new model of computer interface design. Information was no longer restricted to a 2D linear space, but could now be produced as a landscape to explore in 3D. And with this change came new design tools—blur, transparency, layering, infinite zoom—as well as a new concept of interaction. The reader was now replaced by a user who moved through a 3D space—navigating, browsing, digging deeper.

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Text To Speech





Muriel Cooper and the Visible Language Workshop, Information Landscapes (excerpts), 1994, video


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