“Improvement makes straight roads. Crooked roads without improvement are roads of genius.”
William Blake
In the 1960’s Edward De Bono proposed the theory of LATERAL & LINEAR THINKING, describing several brainstorming techniques like CLUSTERING that allow the writer to develop new methods of imagining. Since then scientists have proven that the Corpus Callosum is the connecting point between both sides of the brain, and that these separate parts do operate quite differently upon our behaviour and expression.
LINEAR LEFT-BRAIN/The Sign Mind: Cumulative change. Logical, structural instinct, learnt knowledge, technique; socially conditioned worldview, methodical, rigid, wants yes/no answers. Objective thought, pulls toward cliché is poor at writing emotion but good at keeping it real, a sense of every day life. It defines the task at hand; identifying patterns, genres, stereotypes. Helps monitor the originality of lateral ideas; analyzing elements for the purpose of mimicry, good for 'keeping ideas REAL', checking for credibility gaps, schmaltz or anything over the top.
LATERAL RIGHT-BRAIN/The Design Mind: Catalytic change. Illogical, intuitive, inspirational, originality, energy, receptive to new ideas; idiosyncratic worldview, creative, random, reacts to stimulus. Subjective thought that hates cliché, is good at writing about emotions but pulls toward over-emotionalism and melodrama, has an instinct for myth and archetypes. It is good for generating lots of UNUSUAL ideas that are outside normal patterns and genres. It keeps us fresh in the way we think about emotional interaction.
There are many examples of LATERAL THOUGHT causing a quantum leap in human expression. The writers Charles Baudelaire and Edgar Allan Poe (circa 1830) probably suffered from carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning, a toxic gas used for illuminating lamps. Chronic CO poisoning would explain Poe's low tolerance for alcohol, recurring chronic fatigue, blackouts, alleged impotence, and hypersensitivity to sensory stimulation of all kinds: sounds, lights, odors, tastes and touch.
Modern authors J.G. Ballard, Samuel R. Delany and J.M.G. LeClézio also employ revolutionary tactics, unshackling their writing from authority, embracing madness as information, making it part of our own experience as we read their work. The legendary guitarist B.B. King learned to play by strumming a piece of wire he’d nailed to the verandah post of his home.
"What I want to do is make you see…"
David Wark Griffin
Monday, July 21, 2008
THE EXPERIENCE OF WRITING & STORYBOARDING:
Good writing should offer more than documentary authenticity or casual honesty. It should perform a function once the trust of religion, that of reconciling us to our experience of life, whether social, domestic or tragic. Through vision, heart, style and wit, art can redeem the experience it presents, rather than idly documenting the discontents of others and adding them to our own.
We should disregard the idea of a writer as a suffering artist, since scriptwriting of all kinds, far from being hard work, can be seen as a form of creative, insightful play.
“At some point films have to stop being films, being stories, and have to begin to come alive, so that people will ask themselves: What about me and my life?”
Rainer Werner Fassbinder, film-maker
There are many books describing the 'rules' of screenwriting, and although these can be useful at times, they can also limit a writer's ability to imagine spontaneously. Writing for interactivity is not like writing prose in a novel, but it is similar to writing scripts for comic books or film screenplays. Also, an interactive art form or genre doesn’t necessarily need a formal beginning, middle and an end - but it should definitely deliver an emotional high, a middle and a low.
The creation of accurately motivated characters is probably the most important contribution a writer can make to any script. Story and character development are intellectual activities, while the creation of good dialogue is usually a function of the ear, not of the brain.
Novels are born in silence; they develop and mature in silence. Scripts are usually talked into being, and the writers and artists must consider the input of many other creative people who contribute through discussion.
The script itself is secondarily a written thing; an elaborate notation, a codified description for other creative people to use as a guide. The words the writer puts on paper are not usually going to be read or photographed. They are structures of words that will ultimately be converted by designers, filmmakers and programmers into sounds, images and actions.
The script is undoubtedly an aesthetic creation, a form of dramatic memory with two basic functions; budgetary and psychological. It allows the producer to plan costs and gives the production team an action plan they can feel confident about. Once the team has taken on a job, the internal logic of the characters within the story can get lost in the mix very rapidly.
In which case, it is the original writer's talent and stubbornness that the team will need to get them through the fog of production, retaining meaning in the story and the integrity of the characters.
In most cases, a first draft script will represent not much more than an abstract treatment of the concept’s potential. The characters should be sufficiently developed and the story dramatic enough to attract credible investors and an excellent creative team.
During redrafting, writers will find themselves involved in an alternating sequence of reductions, expansions and revisions. Everything scripted can be completely changed once production begins; e.g. settings need to be altered, or two characters may have to be condensed into one. During the revision stages, clear-headedness and objectivity are prime virtues for the writers and artists.
Scriptwriters and storyboard artists can be certain of one thing; what they are developing will probably have to be redone once all the other collaborators apply themselves to the material. One of the most serious mistakes writers and artists make is to assume that a producer or director know what they are doing when they select a writer/artist for a particular job.
For most projects there is no ideal person and no foolproof method of selection. The 'rightness' of a person for any given project will hinge not on their rapport with the material, but upon their relationship with the other members of the creative team.
The challenge for the writer/artist is not only to understand the dramatic possibilities of the material, but also how the gifts and interests of team members relate to these possibilities. Students of film apply the French term 'auteur' to directors who so control every aspect of their films that they deserve to be regarded as sole authors.
The writer Harlan Ellison regards the auteur theory as 'corrupt', while Francis Ford Coppola emphasizes the crucial contribution of the screenwriter. Very few films or interactive games are the brainchild of one person, but rather the product of collaboration between a multitude of people using a variety of expensive equipment.
However, the majority of classic films, and games like Myst, Final Fantasy, Quake, and Septerra Core, have been guided by one visionary person – a person driven by the need to tell a story, who is able to inspire others to create a fully realised world into which the audience can escape.
In the development of interactive games, writers get it on paper; programmers make it work, artists make it pretty, designers make it fun and producers make it happen. The collaboration between producer and writer should begin and end with the money, but the collaboration between writers and other members of the creative team only begins with the money.
While money is a perfectly legitimate kick-off for taking on a project, the fascination for a writer/artist is that of collaborating with a range of creative intelligences of a very different sort.
What's needed in this work is imagination, an agile mind, and a facility for on the spot invention; also, tolerance, a sense of humour and a willingness to compromise. Literary genius or an auteur attitude, if you have them, can be problematic and should be left at home. What the producer really needs in a writer/artist is not just a passive interpreter, for there may be no original vision to interpret - but a creative reader of opportunities, (and sometimes an opponent). Someone who will scrutinize hunches and intuitions closely and objectively, looking for whatever unrecognized lines of development they may contain.
We apprehend physical reality, as we do art, film and multimedia, through the interrelationships of light, space, movement, time and sound - but it's absurd to conclude that these mediums are only concerned with the representation of physical reality. The dimensions of art are not the dimensions of 'the real world', but are created by artists and made articulate by them.
Once a project is distributed to the public it would seem to be complete, but the creative process hasn't ended, for the work of art is not the object but the experience of the viewer. Viewing too, is an act of creation, in which the audience's perceptions, experiences and sensibilities give unique meaning to the work.
In Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959, by Alain Resnais), the character Nevers says:
"I believe the art of seeing has to be learned."
And learning, like creation, never ends.
The screen may change but the scribe must still write and draw. When you receive a job brief, write and sketch some pages and get your own first reactions down first before you enter meetings with the client and other collaborators. Apply your imagination and ask questions about the sensations to be offered to the audience. When working with a development team, like any collaboration, the test of the group is how well its members work together.
Project development can be an exponential activity, providing the means to communicate ideas to a client, a cinema audience, one on one with a single interactive user, or between groups of people online, in a wide variety of traditional media, all at once or individually. Each media has a history and language of its own, the aim being to communicate an idea to an audience.
By overlapping images and sounds we can display many levels of understanding simultaneously, engaging them in a real-time experience.
It is possible for a skilled interactive designer to start work directly in the digital realm, relying on creative instinct rather than careful planning. With a well-equipped studio, the designer can sample voices and sounds, switch to other software to edit video, create gaming activities or 3D characters, then while rendering switch again to compose music.
All of this flexibility is great and can work well in an organic free-form context, producing outstanding if sometimes unpredictable results. On a commercial job it is doubtful that a client will finance the work until some kind of preliminary design or plan of action has been submitted for approval.
Does time fly when you’re having fun? Writers and artists must always be thinking about how the audience or the user will experience their creation. Write every idea down straight away; an idea is useless if it isn’t written down.
“Opposition is true friendship.”
William Blake
We should disregard the idea of a writer as a suffering artist, since scriptwriting of all kinds, far from being hard work, can be seen as a form of creative, insightful play.
“At some point films have to stop being films, being stories, and have to begin to come alive, so that people will ask themselves: What about me and my life?”
Rainer Werner Fassbinder, film-maker
There are many books describing the 'rules' of screenwriting, and although these can be useful at times, they can also limit a writer's ability to imagine spontaneously. Writing for interactivity is not like writing prose in a novel, but it is similar to writing scripts for comic books or film screenplays. Also, an interactive art form or genre doesn’t necessarily need a formal beginning, middle and an end - but it should definitely deliver an emotional high, a middle and a low.
The creation of accurately motivated characters is probably the most important contribution a writer can make to any script. Story and character development are intellectual activities, while the creation of good dialogue is usually a function of the ear, not of the brain.
Novels are born in silence; they develop and mature in silence. Scripts are usually talked into being, and the writers and artists must consider the input of many other creative people who contribute through discussion.
The script itself is secondarily a written thing; an elaborate notation, a codified description for other creative people to use as a guide. The words the writer puts on paper are not usually going to be read or photographed. They are structures of words that will ultimately be converted by designers, filmmakers and programmers into sounds, images and actions.
The script is undoubtedly an aesthetic creation, a form of dramatic memory with two basic functions; budgetary and psychological. It allows the producer to plan costs and gives the production team an action plan they can feel confident about. Once the team has taken on a job, the internal logic of the characters within the story can get lost in the mix very rapidly.
In which case, it is the original writer's talent and stubbornness that the team will need to get them through the fog of production, retaining meaning in the story and the integrity of the characters.
In most cases, a first draft script will represent not much more than an abstract treatment of the concept’s potential. The characters should be sufficiently developed and the story dramatic enough to attract credible investors and an excellent creative team.
During redrafting, writers will find themselves involved in an alternating sequence of reductions, expansions and revisions. Everything scripted can be completely changed once production begins; e.g. settings need to be altered, or two characters may have to be condensed into one. During the revision stages, clear-headedness and objectivity are prime virtues for the writers and artists.
Scriptwriters and storyboard artists can be certain of one thing; what they are developing will probably have to be redone once all the other collaborators apply themselves to the material. One of the most serious mistakes writers and artists make is to assume that a producer or director know what they are doing when they select a writer/artist for a particular job.
For most projects there is no ideal person and no foolproof method of selection. The 'rightness' of a person for any given project will hinge not on their rapport with the material, but upon their relationship with the other members of the creative team.
The challenge for the writer/artist is not only to understand the dramatic possibilities of the material, but also how the gifts and interests of team members relate to these possibilities. Students of film apply the French term 'auteur' to directors who so control every aspect of their films that they deserve to be regarded as sole authors.
The writer Harlan Ellison regards the auteur theory as 'corrupt', while Francis Ford Coppola emphasizes the crucial contribution of the screenwriter. Very few films or interactive games are the brainchild of one person, but rather the product of collaboration between a multitude of people using a variety of expensive equipment.
However, the majority of classic films, and games like Myst, Final Fantasy, Quake, and Septerra Core, have been guided by one visionary person – a person driven by the need to tell a story, who is able to inspire others to create a fully realised world into which the audience can escape.
In the development of interactive games, writers get it on paper; programmers make it work, artists make it pretty, designers make it fun and producers make it happen. The collaboration between producer and writer should begin and end with the money, but the collaboration between writers and other members of the creative team only begins with the money.
While money is a perfectly legitimate kick-off for taking on a project, the fascination for a writer/artist is that of collaborating with a range of creative intelligences of a very different sort.
What's needed in this work is imagination, an agile mind, and a facility for on the spot invention; also, tolerance, a sense of humour and a willingness to compromise. Literary genius or an auteur attitude, if you have them, can be problematic and should be left at home. What the producer really needs in a writer/artist is not just a passive interpreter, for there may be no original vision to interpret - but a creative reader of opportunities, (and sometimes an opponent). Someone who will scrutinize hunches and intuitions closely and objectively, looking for whatever unrecognized lines of development they may contain.
We apprehend physical reality, as we do art, film and multimedia, through the interrelationships of light, space, movement, time and sound - but it's absurd to conclude that these mediums are only concerned with the representation of physical reality. The dimensions of art are not the dimensions of 'the real world', but are created by artists and made articulate by them.
Once a project is distributed to the public it would seem to be complete, but the creative process hasn't ended, for the work of art is not the object but the experience of the viewer. Viewing too, is an act of creation, in which the audience's perceptions, experiences and sensibilities give unique meaning to the work.
In Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959, by Alain Resnais), the character Nevers says:
"I believe the art of seeing has to be learned."
And learning, like creation, never ends.
The screen may change but the scribe must still write and draw. When you receive a job brief, write and sketch some pages and get your own first reactions down first before you enter meetings with the client and other collaborators. Apply your imagination and ask questions about the sensations to be offered to the audience. When working with a development team, like any collaboration, the test of the group is how well its members work together.
Project development can be an exponential activity, providing the means to communicate ideas to a client, a cinema audience, one on one with a single interactive user, or between groups of people online, in a wide variety of traditional media, all at once or individually. Each media has a history and language of its own, the aim being to communicate an idea to an audience.
By overlapping images and sounds we can display many levels of understanding simultaneously, engaging them in a real-time experience.
It is possible for a skilled interactive designer to start work directly in the digital realm, relying on creative instinct rather than careful planning. With a well-equipped studio, the designer can sample voices and sounds, switch to other software to edit video, create gaming activities or 3D characters, then while rendering switch again to compose music.
All of this flexibility is great and can work well in an organic free-form context, producing outstanding if sometimes unpredictable results. On a commercial job it is doubtful that a client will finance the work until some kind of preliminary design or plan of action has been submitted for approval.
Does time fly when you’re having fun? Writers and artists must always be thinking about how the audience or the user will experience their creation. Write every idea down straight away; an idea is useless if it isn’t written down.
“Opposition is true friendship.”
William Blake
COMPUTER GENERATED IMAGERY:
What is it really good for, besides creating what is 'unreal' in epic fantasy films? What about testing the long-term durability of architecture before construction begins, or rebuilding missing bone tissue to repair the skull of an accident victim?
The dinosaurs in Jurassic Park (1993) are believable because they have been skillfully incorporated into the realistic context of the film. If the context is real, then so are the dinosaurs. The flat 'characters' that once inhabited interactive games have become 3D renderings of people and monsters, moving through realistic rooms/landscapes, with shadows and lens flare.
Many people play computer games, or use interactive software like PhotoShop or Lightwave. How many users have experienced the sensation of having 'crossed-over' into a zone of fluent response with their computer? There’s an ambiguous point of amalgamation in interactivity when the user begins to respond in real time with the software, experiencing an actual sense of physical and mental cohesion with the machine.
In 3D games in which the first-person “I” player/author can switch identities during the game, most regular players will prefer and identify with only one of the characters. A relationship develops between characters and the audience, drawing them into the story. Make your heroes more human and they will have more impact, as they will be perceived as being more 'real'.
The creator of role-playing game Septerra Core, Brian Babendererde, argued with the publishers Viacom that the main character Maya, who dies at the end of the game, shouldn’t be brought back from the dead for a sequel; “It’s epic, it’s drama, it’s reality. People don’t live forever like iconic characters. People die in real life”.
Because interactivity can draw on so many different media, 'scriptwriting' for multimedia involves planning procedures with no specific, formal doctrine of practice, adding totally new dimensions to the composition process. Since the range of content is potentially infinite, clearly guiding the user through the multimedia is the primary challenge for the writers and artists.
Presenting information as a replacement for a real experience is a very delicate artificial construct, but people need choices and the rewards of information freedom are worthwhile and much needed. The potential is infinite; try to understand what’s possible within a budget, without preconceptions of purpose.
SIMPLICITY is key - find out how much the client can spend, then decide on the top priorities that need to be completed first.
In producing an interface an adaptable multimedia writer or designer can be involved variously:
• Contributing to the Design Documents
• Inventing Design Strategy
• Expanding the Scope of a Project
• Developing Marketing Ideas
• Development of Electronic Promo Kits
• Researching Educational References
• R & D of Navigation Principles
• Designing for ”User-Friendliness”
• Technical Manuals for Service Providers
• Product Testing of Target Audiences
• Product Image and other considerations
• Production of © Materials/Legal issues
With a new delight we can use all those ancient languages and all that knowledge to further inform what we need to communicate interactively. We can write words, sample texts, make music, create links, draw maps, play games, photograph life, record reality in every form, build web-sites for every country, acquire knowledge and project any idea at any time, globally.
In the context of interactive multimedia, CONTENT IS ACTIVITY, not just information delivery.
The dinosaurs in Jurassic Park (1993) are believable because they have been skillfully incorporated into the realistic context of the film. If the context is real, then so are the dinosaurs. The flat 'characters' that once inhabited interactive games have become 3D renderings of people and monsters, moving through realistic rooms/landscapes, with shadows and lens flare.
Many people play computer games, or use interactive software like PhotoShop or Lightwave. How many users have experienced the sensation of having 'crossed-over' into a zone of fluent response with their computer? There’s an ambiguous point of amalgamation in interactivity when the user begins to respond in real time with the software, experiencing an actual sense of physical and mental cohesion with the machine.
In 3D games in which the first-person “I” player/author can switch identities during the game, most regular players will prefer and identify with only one of the characters. A relationship develops between characters and the audience, drawing them into the story. Make your heroes more human and they will have more impact, as they will be perceived as being more 'real'.
The creator of role-playing game Septerra Core, Brian Babendererde, argued with the publishers Viacom that the main character Maya, who dies at the end of the game, shouldn’t be brought back from the dead for a sequel; “It’s epic, it’s drama, it’s reality. People don’t live forever like iconic characters. People die in real life”.
Because interactivity can draw on so many different media, 'scriptwriting' for multimedia involves planning procedures with no specific, formal doctrine of practice, adding totally new dimensions to the composition process. Since the range of content is potentially infinite, clearly guiding the user through the multimedia is the primary challenge for the writers and artists.
Presenting information as a replacement for a real experience is a very delicate artificial construct, but people need choices and the rewards of information freedom are worthwhile and much needed. The potential is infinite; try to understand what’s possible within a budget, without preconceptions of purpose.
SIMPLICITY is key - find out how much the client can spend, then decide on the top priorities that need to be completed first.
In producing an interface an adaptable multimedia writer or designer can be involved variously:
• Contributing to the Design Documents
• Inventing Design Strategy
• Expanding the Scope of a Project
• Developing Marketing Ideas
• Development of Electronic Promo Kits
• Researching Educational References
• R & D of Navigation Principles
• Designing for ”User-Friendliness”
• Technical Manuals for Service Providers
• Product Testing of Target Audiences
• Product Image and other considerations
• Production of © Materials/Legal issues
With a new delight we can use all those ancient languages and all that knowledge to further inform what we need to communicate interactively. We can write words, sample texts, make music, create links, draw maps, play games, photograph life, record reality in every form, build web-sites for every country, acquire knowledge and project any idea at any time, globally.
In the context of interactive multimedia, CONTENT IS ACTIVITY, not just information delivery.
CONTENT = ACTIVITY:
Interactivity equals information, imagination and technology, hopefully amalgamated with a higher sense of purpose and something enjoyable to do. Good interactivity is a clear complex of branching and responding graphics and sounds that present a set of practices or communicative behaviours that allow for the logical presentation of information.
PRODUCTIVE CONTENT is all about developing a system of easily accessible navigation metaphors. What different things do computers give us during our 'interaction' with them?
Sound - Dialogue/Voice Over
- Music/Sound Effects
- Silence? For emphasis; to feature an image, or darkness.
Vision - Form/Shapes in Perspective
- Light/Shadow
- Colour/Texture
- Movement/Stillness
WHAT ARE THE GOALS OF THE APPLICATION, AND WHAT DOES THE USER GET TO DO? Discovering what interactivity is really good for and how we make it better or easier for the user is the great challenge for multimedia writers and designers. All the marketing analysis in the world won’t help if the application is uninteresting, slow or difficult to use.
The user will forget your product very quickly if something better comes along.
FAMILIARITY, CLARITY, HONESTY, GENEROSITY, SIMPLICITY and FUN are watchwords to remember. Simplicity doesn’t mean lack of impact, especially if the user is effectively getting what they need.
Nothing succeeds like success, and people will come back for more when that’s what they got before. Monkey see, monkey do.
“There is nothing finer than siding with the oppressed; the true aesthetic consists in defending the weak and the disadvantaged.”
Gerhard Zwerenz
PRODUCTIVE CONTENT is all about developing a system of easily accessible navigation metaphors. What different things do computers give us during our 'interaction' with them?
Sound - Dialogue/Voice Over
- Music/Sound Effects
- Silence? For emphasis; to feature an image, or darkness.
Vision - Form/Shapes in Perspective
- Light/Shadow
- Colour/Texture
- Movement/Stillness
WHAT ARE THE GOALS OF THE APPLICATION, AND WHAT DOES THE USER GET TO DO? Discovering what interactivity is really good for and how we make it better or easier for the user is the great challenge for multimedia writers and designers. All the marketing analysis in the world won’t help if the application is uninteresting, slow or difficult to use.
The user will forget your product very quickly if something better comes along.
FAMILIARITY, CLARITY, HONESTY, GENEROSITY, SIMPLICITY and FUN are watchwords to remember. Simplicity doesn’t mean lack of impact, especially if the user is effectively getting what they need.
Nothing succeeds like success, and people will come back for more when that’s what they got before. Monkey see, monkey do.
“There is nothing finer than siding with the oppressed; the true aesthetic consists in defending the weak and the disadvantaged.”
Gerhard Zwerenz
HYPERTEXT:
Multimedia can deliver the benefits of an additional interactive LEARNING LINK that sensually reinforces the usual 'boring' text or lesson. In test groups of educational applications, learning retention was improved from 30% recall to over 70% when the lesson was presented as play.
The ability to CLICK on a word in a text or an area of the image, that then CONNECTS us to another page, causing the user to experience some new, related EVENT, discovering more about the concept of the first page, constitutes PLAY for the user.
HYPERTEXT is one of the most creative basics of interactive writing. When we 'read' magazines and comics, we are decoding imagery as well as reading text at the same time. Conventional printed forms are sequential - word after word in a single-line sentence, imagery ordered to define meaning, pages numbered to control the order in which the text is read. On the other hand, dictionaries and encyclopedia require us to find a subject in an index, searching several volumes, laterally accessing information; e.g. “M is for Monkey, page 794”.
THE HYPERTEXT THEORY behind multimedia is very complex. In a hypertext document there may be no single order that determines the sequence in which to access the information. This means the user can navigate through the units in a random manner. LINKS are the fundamental unit of hypertext design. Links may be EXPLICIT (as defined by the writer, connecting an anchor node with a destination node) or IMPLICIT (not defined by the writer, but following from the various properties of the information, and selected by the user).
So, with EXPLICIT links the user can read a text about the twin carburetors of an MGB sports car. With another click, they can bring up a 3D/X-ray turntable representation of the vehicle, then pull-down a detailed plan to locate the mixture adjusting nut. The user can also hear sampled audio clips of the engine, with IMPLICIT examples of three different mixture adjustment; too rich, too lean, just right. The user can rev the car and hear how the mixtures perform.
These hypertextual links are the beating heart of interactivity and the essence of being USER-FRIENDLY.
The ability to CLICK on a word in a text or an area of the image, that then CONNECTS us to another page, causing the user to experience some new, related EVENT, discovering more about the concept of the first page, constitutes PLAY for the user.
HYPERTEXT is one of the most creative basics of interactive writing. When we 'read' magazines and comics, we are decoding imagery as well as reading text at the same time. Conventional printed forms are sequential - word after word in a single-line sentence, imagery ordered to define meaning, pages numbered to control the order in which the text is read. On the other hand, dictionaries and encyclopedia require us to find a subject in an index, searching several volumes, laterally accessing information; e.g. “M is for Monkey, page 794”.
THE HYPERTEXT THEORY behind multimedia is very complex. In a hypertext document there may be no single order that determines the sequence in which to access the information. This means the user can navigate through the units in a random manner. LINKS are the fundamental unit of hypertext design. Links may be EXPLICIT (as defined by the writer, connecting an anchor node with a destination node) or IMPLICIT (not defined by the writer, but following from the various properties of the information, and selected by the user).
So, with EXPLICIT links the user can read a text about the twin carburetors of an MGB sports car. With another click, they can bring up a 3D/X-ray turntable representation of the vehicle, then pull-down a detailed plan to locate the mixture adjusting nut. The user can also hear sampled audio clips of the engine, with IMPLICIT examples of three different mixture adjustment; too rich, too lean, just right. The user can rev the car and hear how the mixtures perform.
These hypertextual links are the beating heart of interactivity and the essence of being USER-FRIENDLY.
USER-FRIENDLY:
IT IS WHAT IT IS, I AM WHAT I AM, AND SO ARE YOU: Human beings are social creatures with a natural empathy for others, and our behaviour is what helps us enter the flow of life. Hands up who likes to smile; our actions define our emotions. Laughter is about social connection, when we smile our hearts are moved, endorphins are released in our brains and we experience some kind of truth in the nature of things.
More than any other previous form of expression, interactive multimedia gives us the ability to make the user take control of his or her own 'DEPTH PERCEPTION' on any given subject. This is the facility we must learn to apply when writing and designing for multimedia, and it takes us beyond the limitations of the traditional audience/spectator experience.
At first sight, an interface should deliver a confident 'CAN DO' message. It should contain a sense of readiness, a unique and certain quality of purpose, approachability and effectiveness. This much-coveted 'User-Friendliness' is best achieved by a consistency in graphics, shapes, sounds, textures, colour schemes, layout of pages and screens, navigation metaphors and movements through the application. Whenever we come across a new concept that is particularly complex, multimedia writers and designers must be willing to experiment with expressing that idea in a new and sensory way.
Effortless is what you’re aiming for. It is critical that multimedia users are given all the necessary information that they may not be familiar with, because the interactivity of an application may not be self evident; e.g. imagine the facility to give the rules of a game to a user who hasn't played before. Whatever the subject matter, visual and aural input are the means at your disposal,
and the writer must totally engage the user with their senses, offering choices that cause emotional responses, from interactive web-sites, electronic promo kits (EPK), Playstation games, immersive 3D cinema experiences, etc.
In the 1970’s, Marshal MacLuhan wrote that “The medium is the message.” Via interactivity, the audience now participates and responds within the medium. We are no longer separated from the message, instead we are living and breathing it.
Answer these primary questions to start getting user-friendly:
• How will this application be used? Is it a CD, a web-kiosk, a web-site?
• Why is an interactive appropriate? What can the user gain from this application?
• What features are useful to users? Is it an enjoyable experience?
• How will the application be assessed before mass production?
• What happens after general market release? Does it need to be upgraded?
Very PRECISE PLANNING and exact programming is needed when you structure a hypertext document.
Here are some useful definitions and subjects to consider:
• ICONS: The dictionary defines icon as an image or statue of reverence, which itself is regarded as sacred, or a person/object of conscious desire. In interactivity an icon is a small word, graphic logo or symbol that appears as an indicator on the desktop, usually as a button for opening files, links and applications. Icons are symbolic images that connect to the instinctive impulses of every individual, regardless of nationality, helping to reduce translation problems – the fewer words the better. Each icon/link should be a common metaphor, (colour scheme and navigation method) from screen to screen. Clients can under-estimate the effect of harmonious colours, graphics and sounds on their audience.
• SCREENS: Usually contain text, photos, graphics, hypermedia (hotspots and buttons), other interactive icons and multimedia elements (slide shows, animation, narration, etc.) Consider different sorts of transitions, in keeping with the subject and style of the project.
• ANIMATION: Excellent for colour and movement, and it downloads quickly. It should give the audience what they expect in a different way, and also what they don’t expect. Use the speed and colour of exaggerated cartoon effects, get the user’s attention and create understanding with sharp visual communication.
• VIDEO: Should be harmonious or not used at all. It is powerful but expensive, so only use video if it adds to the overall application. Be careful to balance picture quality with file size.
• SOUND: Should always be of the highest possible quality, appropriate to the style and goals of the application. Be consistent in your sources; don’t try to mix high resolution and low-resolution sound and vision together, unless you’re looking for a discordant style. Precise co-ordination of sounds with other multimedia elements has a lot of impact. It can go very badly when sound and vision are out of synch. Consider applications carefully for standards of delivery, re; sound and vision, and label the size and types of file clearly.
• FOOTPRINTS: Advisable to let the user know where they currently are, where they have been, and where they can go from here. Try to invent imaginative places where these paths and stepping-stones can go, other than the routine or obvious. Be 'Real & Unusual' equally.
• INTERFACE: This refers to the capture, manipulation and integration of digital material into a single-user environment. It is not just the computer screen, but the broader contexts (both physical and intertextual) in which we receive information; the design of software and hardware.
• CONTENT AND CONTEXT: A definition that relates to the way MULTIMEDIA IS ABOUT INFORMATION and the way information is presented. It is about the environment in which the audience 'uses' the information. This environment is capable of allowing trial-and-error exploration, or intuition-friendly navigation, through 3D transitions.
• METATEXTUALITY: This concerns the relationship of 'commentary'. Take into account the possible changes in performative power and the question we should be asking is: What if commentaries could have direct impact on the texts they are commenting upon? Obviously the impact doesn't have to be of the kind its originators think it has or believe it should be. Let's say you criticize a work of art as being perverted and politically incorrect, and as a result of your activity it turns out to be even more perverted. Everything that doesn't kill it, makes it stronger.
There are many other obvious possibilities here; e.g. we may turn any metatextual piece into just another layer of text with or without changing it. Basically all this comes down to the difference between commenting and commanding. Their combination can easily be self-destructive; e.g. a metatext may cause the string of signs it cites to be deleted for good and consequently destroy its own value as commentary. This value is challenged by various other reasons as well. In certain encounters with indeterminate cybertexts, commentaries may turn out to be about one's own singular experience of ephemeral constellations of signs never to be repeated.
• MULTIPLICITY: The web provides facilities for building multiple views of hypertext applications that are linked with other modes within applications. This 'multiple views effect' on narration opens up literature to many interpretations of the same text. With alternative routes there is a never-ending array of possibilities. In print this multiple alternative or branching narrative was first used in Julio Cortazar's novel, Hopscotch (1966). John Irving's The World According to Garp (1976) also offers stories within stories.
In the 1980's there were the “Choose Your Own Adventure” series, which were widely available in children’s books with their binary decision points, encoded within portions of the text. The reader takes partial control of the stories direction. Meaning becomes transcribed by the reader dependent upon which view, or now with the Internet, with what application is being used.
OH-OH! BLACK HOLE: Here is where we come across the exponential problem of too many links with far too many endings available to ever attempt to use every one. Mathematically, narratives can break down with too many links. To have a choice in a one-page story, there would be a resulting three pages, the opening page and the two possible continuations.
To have a five-page story there would be thirty-one pages of choices. But a dozen pages could lead to over four thousand pages of choices, with a forty-page novella needing a trillion pages of material. Queneau's sonnets are the results of selecting randomly from ten possibilities for each line in each sonnet. Again, it is the reader who is the ultimate creator.
"I am large...I contain multitudes."
Walt Whitman
With all this in mind, we should consider our resources, select a destination and plot our course.
More than any other previous form of expression, interactive multimedia gives us the ability to make the user take control of his or her own 'DEPTH PERCEPTION' on any given subject. This is the facility we must learn to apply when writing and designing for multimedia, and it takes us beyond the limitations of the traditional audience/spectator experience.
At first sight, an interface should deliver a confident 'CAN DO' message. It should contain a sense of readiness, a unique and certain quality of purpose, approachability and effectiveness. This much-coveted 'User-Friendliness' is best achieved by a consistency in graphics, shapes, sounds, textures, colour schemes, layout of pages and screens, navigation metaphors and movements through the application. Whenever we come across a new concept that is particularly complex, multimedia writers and designers must be willing to experiment with expressing that idea in a new and sensory way.
Effortless is what you’re aiming for. It is critical that multimedia users are given all the necessary information that they may not be familiar with, because the interactivity of an application may not be self evident; e.g. imagine the facility to give the rules of a game to a user who hasn't played before. Whatever the subject matter, visual and aural input are the means at your disposal,
and the writer must totally engage the user with their senses, offering choices that cause emotional responses, from interactive web-sites, electronic promo kits (EPK), Playstation games, immersive 3D cinema experiences, etc.
In the 1970’s, Marshal MacLuhan wrote that “The medium is the message.” Via interactivity, the audience now participates and responds within the medium. We are no longer separated from the message, instead we are living and breathing it.
Answer these primary questions to start getting user-friendly:
• How will this application be used? Is it a CD, a web-kiosk, a web-site?
• Why is an interactive appropriate? What can the user gain from this application?
• What features are useful to users? Is it an enjoyable experience?
• How will the application be assessed before mass production?
• What happens after general market release? Does it need to be upgraded?
Very PRECISE PLANNING and exact programming is needed when you structure a hypertext document.
Here are some useful definitions and subjects to consider:
• ICONS: The dictionary defines icon as an image or statue of reverence, which itself is regarded as sacred, or a person/object of conscious desire. In interactivity an icon is a small word, graphic logo or symbol that appears as an indicator on the desktop, usually as a button for opening files, links and applications. Icons are symbolic images that connect to the instinctive impulses of every individual, regardless of nationality, helping to reduce translation problems – the fewer words the better. Each icon/link should be a common metaphor, (colour scheme and navigation method) from screen to screen. Clients can under-estimate the effect of harmonious colours, graphics and sounds on their audience.
• SCREENS: Usually contain text, photos, graphics, hypermedia (hotspots and buttons), other interactive icons and multimedia elements (slide shows, animation, narration, etc.) Consider different sorts of transitions, in keeping with the subject and style of the project.
• ANIMATION: Excellent for colour and movement, and it downloads quickly. It should give the audience what they expect in a different way, and also what they don’t expect. Use the speed and colour of exaggerated cartoon effects, get the user’s attention and create understanding with sharp visual communication.
• VIDEO: Should be harmonious or not used at all. It is powerful but expensive, so only use video if it adds to the overall application. Be careful to balance picture quality with file size.
• SOUND: Should always be of the highest possible quality, appropriate to the style and goals of the application. Be consistent in your sources; don’t try to mix high resolution and low-resolution sound and vision together, unless you’re looking for a discordant style. Precise co-ordination of sounds with other multimedia elements has a lot of impact. It can go very badly when sound and vision are out of synch. Consider applications carefully for standards of delivery, re; sound and vision, and label the size and types of file clearly.
• FOOTPRINTS: Advisable to let the user know where they currently are, where they have been, and where they can go from here. Try to invent imaginative places where these paths and stepping-stones can go, other than the routine or obvious. Be 'Real & Unusual' equally.
• INTERFACE: This refers to the capture, manipulation and integration of digital material into a single-user environment. It is not just the computer screen, but the broader contexts (both physical and intertextual) in which we receive information; the design of software and hardware.
• CONTENT AND CONTEXT: A definition that relates to the way MULTIMEDIA IS ABOUT INFORMATION and the way information is presented. It is about the environment in which the audience 'uses' the information. This environment is capable of allowing trial-and-error exploration, or intuition-friendly navigation, through 3D transitions.
• METATEXTUALITY: This concerns the relationship of 'commentary'. Take into account the possible changes in performative power and the question we should be asking is: What if commentaries could have direct impact on the texts they are commenting upon? Obviously the impact doesn't have to be of the kind its originators think it has or believe it should be. Let's say you criticize a work of art as being perverted and politically incorrect, and as a result of your activity it turns out to be even more perverted. Everything that doesn't kill it, makes it stronger.
There are many other obvious possibilities here; e.g. we may turn any metatextual piece into just another layer of text with or without changing it. Basically all this comes down to the difference between commenting and commanding. Their combination can easily be self-destructive; e.g. a metatext may cause the string of signs it cites to be deleted for good and consequently destroy its own value as commentary. This value is challenged by various other reasons as well. In certain encounters with indeterminate cybertexts, commentaries may turn out to be about one's own singular experience of ephemeral constellations of signs never to be repeated.
• MULTIPLICITY: The web provides facilities for building multiple views of hypertext applications that are linked with other modes within applications. This 'multiple views effect' on narration opens up literature to many interpretations of the same text. With alternative routes there is a never-ending array of possibilities. In print this multiple alternative or branching narrative was first used in Julio Cortazar's novel, Hopscotch (1966). John Irving's The World According to Garp (1976) also offers stories within stories.
In the 1980's there were the “Choose Your Own Adventure” series, which were widely available in children’s books with their binary decision points, encoded within portions of the text. The reader takes partial control of the stories direction. Meaning becomes transcribed by the reader dependent upon which view, or now with the Internet, with what application is being used.
OH-OH! BLACK HOLE: Here is where we come across the exponential problem of too many links with far too many endings available to ever attempt to use every one. Mathematically, narratives can break down with too many links. To have a choice in a one-page story, there would be a resulting three pages, the opening page and the two possible continuations.
To have a five-page story there would be thirty-one pages of choices. But a dozen pages could lead to over four thousand pages of choices, with a forty-page novella needing a trillion pages of material. Queneau's sonnets are the results of selecting randomly from ten possibilities for each line in each sonnet. Again, it is the reader who is the ultimate creator.
"I am large...I contain multitudes."
Walt Whitman
With all this in mind, we should consider our resources, select a destination and plot our course.
SCOPE:
In film writing, the full scope of a story needs to be exploited, in the way that incidents may need to be enhanced by locations, and the way the lives of characters change by the end. Fully SCOPING-OUT all areas of development now includes such things as story bibles, marketing tie-ins and action figures.
This is a large part of preliminary multimedia development, expanding further on the lateral hypertext facility. SCOPING-OUT a project incorporates genre, narrative and marketing ideas. Links can be made between all sorts of media within an application, but also to other kinds of resources and products available on the web or in the open market place.
Movies released on DVD can present the film in different formats and languages, while also including an editing suite to recut scenes, director/actor commentaries, production docos, animatics of storyboards, music, unseen footage and bloopers. They can also present special links to online gaming web-sites or to purchase promotional clothing.
Consider these points as you 'scope-out' a project:
• What does the user have to accomplish in the interface?
• Are there different skill levels involved?
• What puzzles mysteries or clues must be solved/gathered?
• Who is your Protagonist or Hero? Who are the Villains?
• What are their various skills or competing qualities?
• What reward does the user receive at the end of the experience?
• What other media or products can be applied to improve this experience?
• What makes your interface different from the rest?
This is a large part of preliminary multimedia development, expanding further on the lateral hypertext facility. SCOPING-OUT a project incorporates genre, narrative and marketing ideas. Links can be made between all sorts of media within an application, but also to other kinds of resources and products available on the web or in the open market place.
Movies released on DVD can present the film in different formats and languages, while also including an editing suite to recut scenes, director/actor commentaries, production docos, animatics of storyboards, music, unseen footage and bloopers. They can also present special links to online gaming web-sites or to purchase promotional clothing.
Consider these points as you 'scope-out' a project:
• What does the user have to accomplish in the interface?
• Are there different skill levels involved?
• What puzzles mysteries or clues must be solved/gathered?
• Who is your Protagonist or Hero? Who are the Villains?
• What are their various skills or competing qualities?
• What reward does the user receive at the end of the experience?
• What other media or products can be applied to improve this experience?
• What makes your interface different from the rest?
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