Today, you are a member of… The CG Maelström
Indulge a Baudrillardian harague here, members. Beware. These days the Computer Graphic Maelström sucks in an array of random objects ranging from Ellen Burstyn to apples, in an ever widening radius, making fakery the gold standard. The exposure to rasterization, texture mapping, Perlin Noise, ray tracing, Phong and Gouraud shading, compositing, Vector Graphics, and rasteration, is on the rise, dear members, seeping into your psyche and bonding with that sometimes ugly, shunned gem called reality. Not that you have to give up your tokusatsu entirely, and certainly, and don’t go off thinking reality is the oil to simulacra’s water, or that fakery is something new. Just occasionally, when tempted to agree with the current ill judgement of non-computer enhanced, non-face-lift looks or the unblinding shine on a tasty organic apple, remember the sage opinions of the poet William S. Burroughs regarding the act of soul-selling for the veneer of youth, beauty, or perfection: “Now, you may encounter the devil’s bargain if you get that far. Any old soul is worth saving, at least to a priest, but not every soul is worth buying—so you can take the offer as a compliment. How does a young body grab you? Like three card monty or the pea under the shell, now you see it, now you don’t. Haven’t you forgotten something, Gramps? In order to feel something, you have to be there. You have to be eighteen. You’re not eighteen. You are seventy-eight. Old fool sold his soul for a strap on.”