http://c64mags.untergrund.net/wiki/index.php?title=Skyhigh_17_About_TDJ/Focus_part_1&feed=atom&action=historySkyhigh 17 About TDJ/Focus part 1 - Revision history2024-03-29T10:43:35ZRevision history for this page on the wikiMediaWiki 1.19.0http://c64mags.untergrund.net/wiki/index.php?title=Skyhigh_17_About_TDJ/Focus_part_1&diff=3770&oldid=prevYmgve at 15:58, 29 November 20072007-11-29T15:58:52Z<p></p>
<p><b>New page</b></p><div>THE BIG INTERVIEW!!!<br />
<br />
You will have to excuse it if the text is a little<br />
mismatched, but this is converted from PC (using my<br />
new Magazine Editor) then converted to Raz's editor!<br />
<br />
<br />
Here is the start of a series of interviews with some<br />
VERY well known guys in the C64 scene today. I<br />
start this series with a very well known Dutch<br />
scener, who (in my opinion) is famous for never<br />
being stuck for a word...Founder member of easily<br />
the best Dutch group(and one of the best in the<br />
scene!)...Welcome TDJ/FOCUS!!!<br />
<br />
TDJ: Thanks MAD .. Nice to finally meet somebody who<br />
asks me for an interview and actually conducts<br />
one as well !! Hasn't happened since 1989 or so..<br />
<br />
MAD: Give the readers a brief description about<br />
yourself...<br />
<br />
TDJ: Sure. I'm 24 years of age, and I live<br />
in The Hague,Holland (where I study<br />
computer science) for almost 3 years now, with<br />
my girlfriend Petra. We have a small but nice<br />
apartment in the centre of the city, - everything<br />
you can think of (shops, cinema's, clubs etc) are<br />
in walking distance, which is good as I used to<br />
live with my parents in the country between farms<br />
.. As for the way I look, I'm not going to tell<br />
you since I can't imagine anybody being interested<br />
in that.<br />
<br />
MAD: How long have you been on the<br />
C64 scene, andwhat other scenes are you a part<br />
of?<br />
<br />
TDJ: Well, I got my c64 in september 1984,<br />
with a diskdrive on christmas that year and started<br />
collecting demo's in 1986, when I became a member<br />
of a notorious group of re-crackers called "Wild<br />
Boys 86" under several handles (of which I managed<br />
to forgot most, thank god .. Romancing The Disk<br />
was one of them). In '87 I worked briefly under<br />
the handle "WAM" (which are in fact my initials)<br />
and released my first demo's for a group I founded<br />
called Royal Swapping Force 2047 (RSF). Quite<br />
funny is the fact that Nightshade/Success, who<br />
only found this out at the X95 party, has a disk<br />
with demo's from that group at home .. Anyway,<br />
RSF was a local group with one big 'rival' in<br />
the neighbourhood, a group called WWE (standing for<br />
World Wide Expressive). When 3 of the 5 RSF members<br />
went amiga I was asked to join WWE which I did<br />
in february 1988 .. The first half year in WWE<br />
was the best time I ever had, and I became great<br />
mates with two of the other members (Charon &amp;<br />
Rhandor) who are until today still my best friends<br />
in the world, next to my girlfriend ofcourse.<br />
We had a nice time, released lots of demo's and<br />
even became a bit famous, also thanks to a great<br />
copyparty we held in october 1988 (Joy-Mgf-WWE<br />
party). I myself did a lot of demo's, got in touch<br />
with a lot of guys and things seemed to be improving<br />
constantly. Until the summer of '89 that was,<br />
when we formed a cooperation with TRC. After that<br />
everything went wrong, most of the original members<br />
left WWE and when the smoke cleared there were<br />
just 3 members, of which I was the longest in<br />
the group .. I tried to build up the group again,<br />
even managed to do so I think but the joy was<br />
gone, so in april of 1990, when I visited the<br />
Horizon party in Sweden,I decided to look for<br />
a new group, got some interesting offers and then<br />
joined Science 451. My first production for them<br />
was released at that same party, a demo called<br />
"Midnight Oil" featuring a 25 chars high multi<br />
color char scroll which could be steered both ways,<br />
unfortunately they didn't show that on the screen<br />
(the fact that it could go both ways).Back in Holland<br />
I formed a subgroup of S451 as we had decided<br />
I should do with 5 other ex-WWE members.The name<br />
of this group was "Focus" and it was officially<br />
founded on 21 april 1990 .. This is over 5 years<br />
ago, in which time we released approx. 17 demo's<br />
and (hopefully) proved to be one of the most<br />
stylish groups in the c64 scene ever. Ofcourse<br />
that is not such a hard thing to do considering<br />
all the talented members I could work with ..Names<br />
like Compyx, Mirage and Hein make most designlovers<br />
drool I guess! Still, we had some hard times as<br />
well, like in 1991 when a lot of dutch people<br />
got upset with me because of some text I wrote<br />
in a demo and even formed anti-groups against<br />
me! The best thing in that period however was<br />
the fact that all other Focus'ers stood behind<br />
me. After winning the Silicon 2 party in the summer<br />
of that year with "Visual Delight" things were<br />
worked out and one of my biggest enemies then<br />
(Action Jackson/TRC) is a good scene friend now<br />
.. Success has its toll though, ours being the<br />
fact that 3 of our members left us: Mirage who<br />
had been in Censor as well decided to work for<br />
them alone and Compyx &amp; X-Byte both joined Black<br />
Mail. Fortunately the latter 2 didn't like it<br />
too much there and left just before Dutch Breeze<br />
was released.Still, we took somewhat of a big<br />
break (some people refer to it as '1992') and<br />
early 1993 we released 4 demo's in a few months<br />
time, returning us to the charts. Then on xmas<br />
'93 (TP3) we won 3rd prize with a preview of<br />
'Visual Delight 2', a demo we managed to postpone<br />
to release until approx. one year later. And now<br />
we are here, 14 guys, all dutch (like all Focus<br />
members in the past as well) and hoping there<br />
still is a public need for that which we create.<br />
Because after the release of VD2 in january of<br />
this year we got virtually no reactions which<br />
made me so 'depressed' that I almost decided to<br />
declare Focus dead ..Sorry to be this brief,<br />
but as I understand there have to be more topics<br />
in this mag than just 'the TDJ story' :)As<br />
for the other scenes: I'm in an amiga group called<br />
'Vivid', with Morris (good friend of mine, excellent<br />
coder), Mirage, Hein and Cycleburner. On the<br />
snes I'm in a trainer-group called 'Cyber Force'<br />
but that's just for fun, actually I don't really<br />
consider myself to be a member as I never did<br />
anything worthwhile for them. Furthermore I'm<br />
in another c64 group called 'Marvel' and finally<br />
I'm in Bonzai (pc), a name which may ring a bell<br />
for a lot of c64 sceners I guess ..Now, I<br />
hope this wasn't too long an answer ??<br />
<br />
MAD:<br />
TDJ The Early Years, published first here in SkyHigh<br />
magazine... Hmm, Marco, that was quite some answer!!!<br />
I guess it is better than a one word answer though!<br />
About Marvel, I guess many readers won't have<br />
heard of Marvel (yet), so how about enlightening<br />
everybody?<br />
<br />
TDJ: Marvel is a c64 demogroup whose<br />
members are all using internet some way or the<br />
other so we can stay in touch rather easy. I started<br />
the group about 18 months ago asking Metal,<br />
Cycleburner and Mirage to join.They did, later<br />
followed Tron, Unifier, Compyx, Mr.Sex and finally<br />
BX. We haven't really started on anything yet but<br />
hope to "hit the public there were it hurts most"<br />
with something real nice soon enough. The only<br />
problem is that there are several others I would<br />
like to join but I don't want Marvel to be too big,<br />
so for the moment we have a 'no more members'<br />
rule. By the way, needless to say that all<br />
members (apart from Unifier) are still in their<br />
own group as well.<br />
<br />
MAD: With a line up like that, I can't wait. Can you<br />
let us all in on any projects?<br />
<br />
TDJ: Okay, there will be a sort of introduction demo<br />
coming quite soon, that is all I can say..<br />
<br />
MAD: You mentioned also being in<br />
Bonzai (PC) -How did you break the 'DANES ONLY'<br />
rule when you joined BONZAI on the PC, along with<br />
MIRAGE /FOCUS?<br />
<br />
TDJ: Well, I didn't break it, they did :).<br />
Anyway, I was exchanging e-mail<br />
with Torben Hansen (Metal), who I've known ever<br />
since he was a member of WWE. He was in Bonzai<br />
and one day he came with the suggestion that Mirage<br />
&amp; me might be able to join as well. But there<br />
was this DANES ONLY rule you already mentioned.<br />
So he gave me the e-mail address of Trap, and<br />
told me to write him a nice letter, maybe making<br />
Trap change his mind. Well, it seems to have worked<br />
as me &amp; Trap became instant friends right away<br />
and after a short while Mirage &amp; me became part<br />
of the Bonzai gang. After that a few more non-Danes<br />
joined, such as MCA (dutch musician, also in Focus),<br />
Unifier (who doesn't know this great swedish coder?)<br />
and Freshman, who used to be in Spirit as well<br />
under a different handle (from Germany). The big<br />
catch here is that all foreign members except<br />
for MCA are on internet so staying in touch isn't<br />
that hard to do .. Ofcourse me &amp; Mirage met some<br />
of the Danes on the Party 4 where they were all<br />
pleasantly surprised by the graphical skills of<br />
my friend Lars (Mirage), as for instance Trap had<br />
never seen any graphics by him before. Mirage even<br />
won Bonzai another prize as he finished 3rd with<br />
his picture in the PC/Amiga gfx compo (out of<br />
a 150)!<br />
<br />
MAD: Explain a bit about your Interent lifestyle...<br />
<br />
TDJ: I'm a huge internet fan, for sure.<br />
It 'gave back' so many of my old friends<br />
such as Cycleburner, Bagder/HZ, Metal, HBH,<br />
Destino and a lot of 'new' ones as well, like<br />
Unifier, Mr.Sex, Bacchus, Tron, Maduplec and several<br />
others. I used to spend quite a few hours per<br />
day on writing e-mail, nowadays I can mostly be<br />
found on irc, channel #c-64. I even have an home<br />
account these days next to my school account, so<br />
I can 'surf cyber' whenever I want to. I hate<br />
to think what this means for my next phonebill<br />
though :(. Now let me give you a small example<br />
of why I love internet so much: this afternoon<br />
I had just started irc, when somebody called 'Elf'<br />
from Norway joined the channel as well. I wrote:<br />
"Elf ?? I knew an Elf/WWE once from Norway" ..<br />
Guess what ?? It was him !! Over 5 years since<br />
I heard of him and here he was again, also knowing<br />
right away who I was. Now that is great !! Another<br />
great thing is that I finally get feedback on the<br />
productions Focus has made. Even if it's negative,<br />
it's better than nothing at all. And when I hear<br />
that somebody thinks Visual Delight 2 is the best<br />
designed and graphical demo of 1994, it makes<br />
me feel real proud !! (Even though the preview<br />
won 3rd prize in 1993 and the demo was finally<br />
spread in 1995). By the way, those who<br />
want to contact me on the 'net can do so by sending<br />
some e-mail to<br />
<br />
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (home) or XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (school)<br />
<br />
MAD: Which computer/console do you find easier to<br />
program on? What do you use to program<br />
on these machines???<br />
<br />
TDJ: Well, I'm kind of ashamed to actually<br />
admit that I'm a real lazy bastard and even though<br />
I've told people that I will start to code on pc<br />
&amp; amiga real soon for acouple of years already<br />
(I even *did* start coding the amiga, in 1988, but<br />
it wasn't a great success) I never actually made<br />
any real attempts. I do code in Turbo Pascal (pc)<br />
though, even did some demo-like thingies in it, which<br />
are now considered to be a lethal weapon here<br />
in Holland, so if I ever show them to somebody I<br />
might be shot. Ofcourse I do code on the c64 as you<br />
may have noticed, and I still hope to find enough<br />
energy and faith to actually start coding other<br />
machines, preferably the pc and the snes since its<br />
m/l looks so much like that of the c64 ..<br />
<br />
MAD: Which computer/console would you say will still<br />
be around in 10 years?<br />
<br />
TDJ: Well, that's very hard to say.<br />
I had a brief discussion with Jeroen<br />
Tel on it as a matter of fact, and he (like me)<br />
thinks there still will be fools using their c64<br />
in 2005 (of which I probably will be one). Alsothe<br />
pc might be around but I guess it has evolved into<br />
something so extremely powerful by then, I couldn't<br />
even imagine what it will be like now .. S. Nintendo's<br />
etc. will be outdated then ofcourse, that is already<br />
happening as we speak. As for Amiga ?? I fear big<br />
fears that it may not survive another 10 years as<br />
well. :(<br />
<br />
MAD: About FOCUS... How big is the group now?<br />
Memberstatus?<br />
<br />
TDJ: Like I have mentioned earlier on,<br />
there are 14 guys in the group nowadays.<br />
This has been so for over a year now, since the<br />
last one joined in and I hope it will stay the same<br />
(well, maybe the number of members will increase,<br />
I've got a couple of people in mind who might<br />
join if they would like to).As for the memberstatus:<br />
Adam (code), Anorganic (code), Compyx (code,gfx),<br />
Fonzie (swap), Heathcliff (code),<br />
Hein (gfx), JVD (music),<br />
MCA (music), Mirage (code,gfx), PDB (gfx), Sander<br />
(gfx), VV (music). X-Byte (code)and yours truly<br />
(code, organising).<br />
<br />
MAD: That certainlyis some line-up! But how do you<br />
rate yourself as a member of Focus ?<br />
<br />
TDJ: Although I'm slowly realising that in fact<br />
I am one of the more famous members of Focus, I<br />
don't think that oding-wise I'm up to<br />
staoders uld de' me<br />
without too much of an effort.<br />
I am lucky enough to be able to come up with<br />
somewhat more original effects now and then, like<br />
the 'zooming plasma', as some have<br />
called it, in VD2, a part of which I am VERY proud.<br />
Thus it seems very strange to me that *I* am in<br />
the coding charts of some magazines<br />
while the others (save for X-Byte &amp; Compyx<br />
sometimes) are not.<br />
Ofcourse I realise that this has more to<br />
do with me being well-known than my qualities, still<br />
I must admit liking it. After all, we all want to<br />
be respected and valued, right ?? But coming back<br />
to my status as a Focus member: I think I am (big<br />
arrogance) more than that. It was I who came up<br />
with the idea of forming this group, I invented the<br />
name and I am the only member ever who has been<br />
in since day 1 and never left (Compyx was a founding<br />
member as well but alas, his Black Mail days ruined<br />
his trackrecord). Still I don't see myself as a<br />
leader, more as an organiser, a mentor even. People<br />
tell me that I have a gift to make them enthusiastic<br />
towards the scene again and I often am surprised<br />
myself to see that certain members, who haven't<br />
done anything for ages, agree to start working on<br />
a new part/music/picture when I ask them to.I<br />
guess it has a lot to do with the fact that I never<br />
'demand' something to happen, after all this is<br />
a hobby and it is supposed to stay that way, don't<br />
you agree ??<br />
MAD: I certainly do. Hostile demands<br />
meet with hostile rejections... While we are on<br />
the subject of new products, what are FOCUS up<br />
to these days? Any games, demos, utilities on the<br />
way?<br />
<br />
TDJ: We are working on several demo's but if there's<br />
one thing I've learnt in all my scene-years<br />
it's never to promise people something actually<br />
will come out :). As for utilities: Compyx has a<br />
couple of nice things he made for himself mostly,<br />
e.g. a very good paint program called BDP, a program<br />
he unfortunately seems to be the only one able to<br />
work with. He also started something resembling<br />
a game several times, in cooperation with several<br />
other FOCUS members but never finished anything.<br />
In fact he was asked to be the painter on Lemmings<br />
after they dumped Nikaj Eijk (which I still think<br />
was a rotten thing to do) but since his'love'<br />
for Remi Ebus, the 'producer' of that game, wasn't<br />
too big (like with the rest of us) it didn't take<br />
him too long to stop working on that either.Two<br />
of our members are working on some very commercial<br />
stuff though. Hein &amp; Mirage are both painting for<br />
a pc-cd rom game and Hein is doinggraphics for<br />
a SNES game as well .. But those activities have<br />
nothing to do with Focus save for the fact that<br />
they both are in that team ..We were also going<br />
to do a demo-scene-only version of Shock but that<br />
project has been put aside until further notice.<br />
And finally me and Compyx are working on something<br />
we call "The Book Of Demo's", a demo encyclopedia.<br />
It will be several disks big and featuring some<br />
kind of hyper-link system Compyx created and which<br />
is very fast.<br />
MAD: FOCUS have always paid much<br />
attention on design. Do you feel that design is<br />
the only thing left to improve on, on the C64? Do<br />
you think that there is anything left to code on<br />
this machine???<br />
<br />
TDJ: I think there is room for much improvement<br />
on both design and coding in the c64 world.<br />
Up until now not too many demo's have found<br />
the right balance between those, except for Tower<br />
Power/Camelot and Dutch Breeze maybe. Truth is,<br />
that whenever good graphics and design are used,<br />
people tend to underrate the code. This happened<br />
with Focus as well, in fact we have been dubbed<br />
koala picture show routine makers' only a few weeks<br />
ago by a member of a certain german group whose<br />
name I will not mention here (I'll only tell you<br />
that they won 2 important c64 compo's in a row,<br />
hehe .. but I don't hold one guys' actions against<br />
an entire group ofcourse). This makes me sad as<br />
I know that we have several guys in our group who<br />
could probably out-code them without any problems<br />
but as our style hasn't left open too much room<br />
to do just that until now, we were never able to<br />
prove it. BUT !! Those in the scene who know how<br />
to read may have noticed my "This is the end of<br />
life but not as you know it" text in the scroll<br />
in the final part of VD2. With that I meant that<br />
we in Focus are (hopefully) going in a new direction,<br />
featuring more original and better coding while<br />
at the same time ofcourse not losing the design<br />
and general graphical overkill we've been known<br />
for. All I can say right now is "sit &amp; wait, maybe<br />
you'll be surprised"! Now let me ask you something,<br />
as I'm always curious to find out, and please be<br />
honest: how do you think Focus fits in the scene,<br />
today and overall ?? Are we an above average group<br />
leaning towards 'legendary status' or just another<br />
demo-group, easily forgotten. Because I myself feel<br />
we haven't reached the legendary status yet,<br />
hopefully we will with our next demo's ..<br />
<br />
MAD: HOLD ON TDJ!!! I don't think this mag will cope<br />
with the masses of text you have written!<br />
<br />
Time to LOAD the SECOND PART of this interview!!!<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR???</div>Ymgve