Sci-fi depictions of everything bothers me. Everything just looks like Tron. Why? Because sci-fi authors are obsessed with shallow aesthetics and design - the "futuristic" look, functionality and objectivity take a back seat. The sad thing is that people like Elon Musk embrace the sci-fi look and that has influenced the new dragon capsule design, the spacesuit design, just because it looks "cool". How about ignoring how something appears, and focusing on functionality, maintainability, operability, serviceability, legibility, etc. Let's replace all buttons and knobs with touchscreens everywhere in a space cockpit because it fits Elon's taste of aesthetics inspired by sci-fi movies. Ugh... this stuff bothers me.
I think you have to separate out the origins of each thing here.
Scifi ideas come from authors, and come primarily from text.
Scifi book covers come from artists, and create a sort of "look and feel" that is at best loosely related to the book, but generally unrelated and may not be chosed by the author.
And then there's Hollywood. By now we're several minds removed from the scifi author and the sausage for public consumption has little resemblance to the original beast. But it definitely has a look and feel.
Think of the early scifi pulp, and although the ideas may be timeless and strong, people picture bug eyed monsters holding damsels wearing brass clothing, and spaceships that stand upright on fins with a ladder leading down the side.
Similarly scifi of the 70's might conjure up images of planetscapes with multiple moons and floating islands in the sky.
I suspect the Tron look is a period theme derived from the state of computer graphics when the movie was authored.
This is the one aspect of The Expanse, the tv series, that I like a lot. One day, I'd actually think their terminal system would actually be a real thing:
(Unfortunately, this would probably require public infrastructure, not private, which just seems to create more walled gardens. But... I digress...)
This approach to technology is really a major difference from the expanse and a lot of other sci-fi. FTA:
> The writers and creators of The Expanse take the view that technology develops over time to serve human needs but it doesn’t do away with those needs by either wholly satisfying them or destroying the people who have them. Technology advances but the human problems remain.
In many ways, a lot of sci-fi writes focuses on technology first, people second. And _that_ often resembles "concept products" that never see the light of day.
I love that show. I picked it up again a couple weeks ago after trailing off during Season 2 because of work.
Agree with all your points, and I'll make one more:
The way that they blend the "gesture" interfaces (the "iPhone" device, the map and orbit planner, the wall screens) with tactile interfaces (physical keyboards at critical positions on the spacecraft, like weapons and burn control) signal they put some deep thought into it. Gesture and touch-screen stuff is fine, in very specific instances. You will need a tactile surface to touch in many of the kind of (future) environments that the show depicts.
I had the exact similar thought: it's the way the touchscreens, voice interaction, and tactile systems melded together felt _intuitive_ instead of showy or glitzy.
While terminals were often just a basic touchscreen, many critical elements, like the chairs on the ships, had tactile input (joysticks, buttons, etc) - to deal with input under gravitational shifts.
I am not sure if I'd call that terminal system anymore useful that those futuristic interfaces where everyone is moving screens around with their hands, headsets with contextual information overlaid atop objects, etc.
They ignore:
1) Usability and ergonomics
2) Privacy implications
3) Technical feasibility
4) Operability in adverse conditions
5) Health effects
I could list more. Also, why do these futuristic interfaces have so much pizzaz, its no less decorative than say victorian frames with french curves. Instead, we have 45 degree lines and chamfers. WHY!?
The entire sci-fi aesthetics throw away what we know about the world, pragmatism and functionalism. Instead, sci-fi aesthetics focus on what looks cool. If future is full of this kind of interfaces, devices and aesthetics; I don't want to be part of it.
I also understand the fiction bit in science fiction. This is a collection of ideas imagined and not supposed to be practical. That's fine and treat it like Harry Potter or any fictional world. But, when you start desiging real things with consequences (such as human-machine interfaces where astronaut's lives depend on), I have a problem with that. Marketing is not the language of nature and decoration is a crime.
As somebody who makes films himself this isn’t quite as easy: although I personally agree with your sentiment, the task of a story you told in the filmic medium usually isn’t to be realistic. What studios instead care about is to create a world that most people can believe in.
And sometimes this means to make something look futuristic just to constantly remind viewers that this is a completely different universe.
Additionally set designers have usually quite little time to think about all the details. They are essentially in the job of cobbling together something that looks ok in as little time as possible for as little money as possible.
When it comes to interfaces in films I kinda like the way Alien (1979) did it: very realistic, kinda gritty, very distinct graphical language
I enjoyed reading your response. You're right, movie makers and studios, comic artists and set designers - they are all doing what they need to do to realize the vision of the writer/director. I think the onus is on engineers who should balance all aspects of design, engineering, cost and manufacturing to come up with an optimal product. They shouldn't be making tradeoffs in favor for frivolous endeavors. Applies to both, software and hardware products and services.
That said, we have Steve Jobs (and his fundamentalism in aesthetics over functionality), Elon Musk and many other successful people in the history who have twisted the equation.
The interesting question here is: Isn't what Steve Jobs was doing and Elon Musk is doing, very similar to what set designers do in film? Their designs are certainly meant to tell a story, to get the fantasy of the "audience" going.
And just judging the sales it kinda works for Apple. Elon Musk is certainly in the trade of selling stories as well, and he is quite good at it which explains his sucess.
As somebody who moves between engineering and design a lot I like to stress this: cosmetics and storytelling by design are not without their function. I also hate it when the cosmetics become everything and the function nothing, but many engineers don't realize that the cosmetics alone can change the perception of things so much, that they impact both function and the real world usage.
A curious example is the Mexican neighbourhood of Las Palmitas¹ – a hillside part of town with drug problems. Instead of investing into drug prevention the government just painted the houses with colors. This apparently changed more in the communities conduct than any invisible but functional thing could have ever done.
The fictional part of design (so once you see a thing, what does it invoke in you), is something that often gets completely ignored by engineers, just like the functional aspect sometimes gets ignored by designers (although I'd call them bad designers then).
I also dislike modern design, but I dislike it because of how boring and meaningless it is. Architecture's a good example: brutalism conveys meaninglessness in a heavy-handed way, whereas modern architecture does it effortlessly. Smartphones represent the pinnacle of modern design: "This is a plain, perfect geometric figure, nothing more. It was not crafted by anything as messy and complex as human dreams, nor is it tainted by any human story or aspiration. Its existence is fundamental, inexorable."
