Core Animation - Tech Demo promises

[digitalpencil]

I've been looking over some of the earlier tech demos from WWDC 07 where Steve introduced upcoming features from Leopard and was hoping someone more knowledgeable than myself could shed some light on certain issues.

Namely, what happened to the tech demo apps that showed off Core Animation's possibilities? and, why did we never see apps this impressive come to fruition?

This first video is of Steve's introduction to Core Animation and shows a hugely impressive app in which all your mac's videos are collated in a 3D wall similar to Apple TVs. What's really impressive though (i'm sure you'll agree) is the search feature in which tagged vids, fly out on request and collate in a coverflow-style interface.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyd8O-2mkgk

The second video I imagine most of us are familiar with, and was another tech demo showing off screensaver type animation possibilities in which large 3D structures are assembled from your iPhoto Library.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srDkugKfGY0&NR=1

Now i've managed to find a 3D screensaver similar to the above by a guy called David McNerney which is a great little app and begins to show some similar animation techniques (i imagine it's largely based on these earlier tech demos).

see for yourself at: http://davidmcnerney.com/MovingPhotos3D/


So. What happened to these tech demos? Was Leopard not actually capable of delivering on these promises? We're the rigs used custom-built behemoths and would regular macs be incapable of living up to live animation on this scale? why are apps like David McNerney's above, which although pretty damn cool, nowhere near as impressive as these preliminary demos?

Has Apple ever issued any statements answering any of these queries?

 

[Catfish_Man]

Most developers are more interested in creating useful apps than flashy ones. Building demos like that is hard, doesn't support Tiger, and ends up not getting you much beyond the 'wow' factor.

There's also the issue that most Macs shipped recently have had integrated graphics; I haven't done enough CA work to say with any authority, but I'd imagine that's a good deal more limited than whatever top of the line machines they run demos on.

 

[digitalpencil]

Most developers are more interested in creating useful apps than flashy ones. Building demos like that is hard, doesn't support Tiger, and ends up not getting you much beyond the 'wow' factor.

There's also the issue that most Macs shipped recently have had integrated graphics; I haven't done enough CA work to say with any authority, but I'd imagine that's a good deal more limited than whatever top of the line machines they run demos on.

I can totally agree that on the most part these are simply flashy interfaces and very counter-intuitive in terms of useful HCI but the small child in me loves the flash and feels somewhat lied to

I guess these really were just a future forecast of what might be possible with enough bare resources to play with but it sure would be nice to see them in action and actually see what's possible with this tech. Ah well, maybe in 10.7 i'll have my dream screen saver.. you never know!