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Science Fiction Interfaces

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11–20 of 60 posts

Re: Science Fiction Interfaces

#11

There's an overarching theme here of thin neon lines and white text on black background. Its interesting to me that despite the popularity of this in movies as the default "futuristic" computer interface, it rarely seems to make its way into actual software and especially web/app UI. One exception i can think of is the Bloomberg terminal. I find this odd because its easier on the eyes and looks better. I would honest…

The standard answer here will be to have Flux, but that doesn't really accomplish what you are looking for.

I think once you start setting OLED on the desktop, you'll begin to see more work being done in this area.

I am also a huge fan of dark backgrounds; under the right circumstances. It can make you really focus in on specific content if the interface is minimalistic in its approach.

Re: Science Fiction Interfaces

#12

There's an overarching theme here of thin neon lines and white text on black background. Its interesting to me that despite the popularity of this in movies as the default "futuristic" computer interface, it rarely seems to make its way into actual software and especially web/app UI. One exception i can think of is the Bloomberg terminal. I find this odd because its easier on the eyes and looks better. I would honest…

Dark UI doesn't look great in a glass-wall office during a morning board meeting, and it wastes ink. :)

Re: Science Fiction Interfaces

#13
My favorite has always been the UI in 2001: A Space Odyssey, with it's use of the EuroStile font on solid screen-filling colors.

It was borrowed by Pixar for The Incredibles.

Re: Science Fiction Interfaces

#14
post #2

I remember the days when all the flash websites looked like this. With all the pixel fonts of 8 px height. http://www.2advanced.com/ Was one of my favorites! (I can't even see it now as the flash is blocked by Chrome) I actually miss that style, good thing it still exists in movies. Oblivion had also very nice GUI's. But Gmunk has a lot of other great work! http://www.gmunk.com/OBLIVION-GFX

I like the style too. I couldn't use the 2advanced site, because, while it loaded after I accepted Flash (Firefox), everything was tiny on my high-resolution screen, and zooming did nothing.

If you navigate directly to the .swf file, it might be scaled to the full browser window. That used to work for Homestar Runner about a decade ago.

Re: Science Fiction Interfaces

#15

There's an overarching theme here of thin neon lines and white text on black background. Its interesting to me that despite the popularity of this in movies as the default "futuristic" computer interface, it rarely seems to make its way into actual software and especially web/app UI. One exception i can think of is the Bloomberg terminal. I find this odd because its easier on the eyes and looks better. I would honest…

I know this doesn't apply to your needs, however OSX/macOS has the ability to "Invert Display Color" and I use it all the time for precisely the use case you described.

some digging around I found Stylish [1] chrome extension which allows you to select dark modes (and others) for many common websites. Unfortunately many of the dark themes are really just dark grey, whereas I really prefer a deep inky black. My pixel xl has an amoled display which makes night modes look stunning because the pixels actually turn off with true black.

I used this app [2] to read hacker news and im delighted to find they have a web interface as well which has a dark mode

[1] userstyles.org [2] hn.premii.com

Re: Science Fiction Interfaces

#17
The greatest UI in the history of films cannot be captured visually: it is the UI in Spike Jonze's "Her".

The second greatest, though, is quite visual: the interface in Minority Report.

I wish I could find the interviews with the UI engineers who talked about the influences that went into it.

Re: Science Fiction Interfaces

#18

The greatest UI in the history of films cannot be captured visually: it is the UI in Spike Jonze's "Her". The second greatest, though, is quite visual: the interface in Minority Report. I wish I could find the interviews with the UI engineers who talked about the influences that went into it.

These are great 'low tech' interfaces. Now if you want a great 'advanced' interface think anything in the Cyberpunk genre, hard to beat direct brain interactions. Who needs clumsy words and floating pictures :)

Re: Science Fiction Interfaces

#19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like the style too. I couldn't use the 2advanced site, because, while it loaded after I accepted Flash (Firefox), everything was tiny on my high-resolution screen, and zooming did nothing.

If you navigate directly to the .swf file, it might be scaled to the full browser window. That used to work for Homestar Runner about a decade ago.

Thanks. Homestar - I loved that. Must visit again.

Re: Science Fiction Interfaces

#20
My favourite sci-fi interface so far is the 'sand' interface in the superman scene on Krypton. Russel Crowe uses it to blast light into a baby.

https://youtu.be/nHmLhRx7Oyw?t=1m50s

I think it would be great for the eyes cause you are forced to exercise your depth perception rather than stare at a flat screen. Would even be better than an e-ink monitor[http://www.dasung.com/].

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