Upgrading Aesthetics of Technology

So I'm working on a Science-Fiction/Fantasy setting. I was thinking it'd be interesting to play with Zeerust and Aesthetics of Technology. The more advanced a technology is, the less zeerusty it appears. For example:

Gen 1 Tech=Steampunk

Gen 2 Tech=Raygun Gothic

Gen 3 Tech=Typical Cyberpunk (I'm not sure about this one at the moment)

Gen 4 Tech=Everything Is an iPod in the Future

edited 11th Mar '15 11:27:30 AM by Protagonist506

So... are you working in a visual medium? Or are you writing?

Because you're going to have a hard time communicating visual aesthetics in a non-visual medium.

edited 11th Mar '15 7:09:29 PM by Tungsten74

@Tungsten: I'm not sure that I agree: while it may be less easy than in a visual medium, it should be quite feasible to describe the aesthetics when relevant.

For examples:
You might have a character running down the street. The bright sunlight gleams and glints yellow on the brass gears and pistons of his armour; steam hisses its exertion as it lends him strength.

A character might stand before a wall that bars their way. They raise a bulbous gun, sighting over the curving fin. They squeeze the trigger, releasing a ring-shaped blast of bright energy that disintegrates a near-perfect circle of masonry, granting them access to the hallway beyond.

Another character might sneak into a building. Cool blue light glints on the half-embedded, softly whining cybernetics of their arm. They raise a hand to the oily, complex machinery of the neural interface on back of their neck, and with a tap jack into the building's security. Bright geometric shapes flash over their vision, outlining the building's security; with a flick of a too-blue eye they dive into this little cyberspace, seeking the information that they came for.

Finally, a fourth character might stand before a locked door. They raise their sleek white net-pad, and with a gesture connect to the door. A few more deft motions find its locking code; a third instructs the door to unlock. The way now unbarred, a touch makes the net-pad fold down to pocket-size and deactivate; they put it in a shirt pocket and venture onward.

(I'll admit that these may not be the best depictions, but they're fairly quick and are primarily meant to indicate that it's quite possible to convey such aesthetics.)

edited 12th Mar '15 7:11:01 AM by ArsThaumaturgis

And now I want to read the book in your head....

Yeah, I think you can evoke quite well, perhaps with the aesthetic depending on culture or location. Look at London versus Bristol in the UK in terms of buildings and even historical structures; Milton Keynes to Cambridge.

Or in the US - Detroit to somewhere sleepy in Michigan.

If you're going to write through generations, then maybe the main technology upgrade can be a story of its own, sort of like Terry Pratchett's (mayherestinpeace) novels about how wizards or alchemists or something invented the film industry. Although something like the invention of condoms in a high fantasy setting was kind of incidental, and, you know, I could believe it, rubber is basically tree sap, they had the Victorian-era workhouse and some other book mentioned in the same town that the ladies wore gowns and bustles, and there were demonically-possessed voice recorders in the same setting, so.