STEPS IN DEVELOPING INTERACTIVE MULTIMEDIA

UNIT III – DEVELOPING MULTIMEDIA

 

STEPS IN DEVELOPING INTERACTIVE MULTIMEDIA

 

The three phases of multimedia development and the steps they involve are given

 

below:

Phase 1 – Planning

 

Step 1 : Developing the concept

 

Step 2 : Stating the purpose

 

Step 3 : Identifying the target audience

 

Step 4 : Determining the treatment

 

Step 5 : Developing the specifications

 

Step 6 : Storyboard and navigation

 

Phase 2 – Creating

 

Step 7 : Developing the content

 

Step 8 : Authoring the title

 

Phase 3 – Testing

 

Step 9 : Testing the title

THE PLANNING PHASE

 

STEP 1 : DEVELOPING THE CONCEPT

 

Every multimedia project originates as an idea. The idea for what was to become a series of very popular multimedia title. The process of generating idea can be as unstructured as brainstorming session. The company might have a process for generating new product ideas that includes asking questions about the current product line. Such a series of questions might consist of the following :

 

How can we improve it (make it faster, use better-quality graphics or updated content)?

 

How can we change the content to appeal to a different market (consumer, education, corporate)?

 

How can we take advantage of new technologies (virtual reality, speech recognition)? How can we make it disposal?

 

How can we change it from a single title to series?

 

How can we repackage or repurpose our content (books, movies, games, reference materials, brochures, magazines)?

 

Ideas can provide the vision, but they must be presented in a way that can guide the development process. That is, they must be stated as clear, measurable, and obtainable objectives.

STEP 2 : STATING THE PURPOSE

 

Once a concept has been developed, project goals and objectives need to be specified.

 

This is perhaps the most critical step in multimedia planning. Goals are broad statements of

 

what the project will accomplish, whereas objectives are more precise statements. Goals and

 

objectives help direct the development process and provide a way to evaluate the title both

 

during and after its development. Because multimedia development is a team process,

 

objectives are necessary to be stated in measurable terms, and they need to provide for a

 

timeline. The goal for a specific multimedia title must fit within the overall mission of the

 

company or organization.

 

Example for GOALS,

 

“Be the leader in educational CDs”

 

“Use multimedia to reduce our training costs”

 

“Produce the best CD title on fly fishing”

 

Example for OBJECTIVES,

 

“To develop an entertainment title based on the book Tracks which chronicles own women’s journey across the continent of Australia. The title will include an interactive map and allows viewing photographs and text about any selected map location. Sound clips will provide narrations.”

STEP 3 : IDENTIFYING THE TARGET AUDIENCE

 

The more information a developer has about potential users, the more likely a title can be created that will satisfy the users’ needs and be successful. Audience can be described in many ways, in terms of demographics (location, age, sex, marital status, education, income and so on) as well as life style and attitudes. Developer must determine what information is needed & how specifically to define the audience. There is a trade-off between the size of an audience and a precise definition of it. Companies want to identify as large an audience as possible in order to maximize potential sales. The large the audience, however, the more diverse its needs and the more difficult it is to “give them what they want”.

STEP 4 : DTERMINING THE TREATMENT

 

“What is the ‘look and feel’ can include such things as the title’s tone, approach, metaphor and emphasis.

TONE :

 

While the title be humorous, serious, light, formal? Many multimedia titles intended for home use, such as games and recreational titles, include humor, whereas those intended for business use are more serious in their tone. Titles intended for children tend to be whimsical, whereas training titles are generally straightforward and conservative.

APPROACH :

 

How much direction will be provided to the user? Some titles, especially children’s games and interactive books, focus on exploration. The child is provided with scene with little or no instructions. The child click on various objects and some action occurs.

 

Other titles, especially adult education applications, provide a great deal of direction. Users are provided with menu choices and generally must follow predetermined path in order to complete the title. Other titles simply have a help button that triggers a help screen.

METAPHOR :

 

Will a metaphor be used to provide interest or to aid in understanding the title? The Explorapedia title uses space travel as the theme for exploring different areas of content such as Nature and People. The TOEIC test program uses a mountain-climbing metaphor. The Odyssey humanities instructional program uses a sailing adventure metaphor in which students choose from various island destinations.

EMPHASIS :

 

It is important to consider the significance of each element based on the concept, objectives & audience for the title. The budget & time are relative weight placed on text, sound, animation, graphics and video. For example, a company may want to develop a title that introduces its product line, including video clip demonstration on how each product works. But if the budget did not allow for the expense of creating the video segments, emphasis would be on still images with text.

STEP 5 : DEVELOPING THE SPECIFICATIONS

 

Project Specifications to a Specifications list what will be included on each screen, including the arrangement of each element and the functionality of each object (for example, what happens when you click on the button labeled Next). Specifications should be as detailed as possible. The more detailed and precise the specifications, the greater the chance of creating a title that will meet the objectives of the project on time and within budget.

 

There are certain elements that should be included in the specifications for all titles.

 

These are listed below :

 

Target playback system(s) Elements to be included Functionality

 

User interface

Target Playback Systems :

 

The decision of what computers to target for playback is usually not difficult and in some cases not even discretionary. For example, an instructor who is developing a multimedia presentation would be confined to the playback system set up in the classroom; a sales representative might be restricted by the model of laptop computer that he carries; or a person developing a title that runs on a kiosk would be restricted to the kiosk hardware.

 

Companies developing commercial titles intended for the business market are guided by the fact that 80 percent of desktop computers are windows based systems. Companies developing for the education market, on the other hand, are faced with a majority of the computers being Apple systems. Household computers are more evenly divided; so many companies targeting the home market develop for both platforms.

 

Elements to be included :

 

The specifications should include, as much as possible, details about the various elements that are to be included in the title. If sound is used, should it be recorded at 44 MHz, 16 bit, stereo? Should the resolution for the graphics be 8 bit, 256 colors? Should video be designed to play back at 15 frames per second? At what size? What are the sizes of the various objects such as photos, buttons, text blocks, and pop-up boxes? What font, point sizes and type styles are to be used? What are the colors for the various objects? The multimedia elements chosen may require other specs. For example, if a narration of voice over is used, a script would be part of the specifications.

 

Functionality :

 

Objects such as text, graphics, buttons, and hypertext are often part of multimedia title. The specifications should include how the program reacts to an action by the user, such as a mouse click. For example, clicking on a door might cause the door to open; an “Exit the program?” message to appear(text); or an entire new screen to be displayed. The user needs feedback that the button has been selected, such as the button appearing “pressed”, If no feedback is given, the user might click on the button again. Navigating from one screen to next screen using buttons.

 

User Interface :

 

The user interface involves designing the appearance how each object is arranged on the screen – and the interactivity – how the user navigates through the title. The design issues relating to multimedia are extremely important, and the next chapter is devoted to studying them.

STEP 6 : STORYBOARD AND NAVIGATION

 

“What do the screens look like and how are they linked?”

 

Multimedia borrows many of its development processes from movies, including the use of storyboards. A storyboard is a representation of what each screen will look like and how the screens are linked. The storyboard serves multiple purposes.

 

To provide an overview of the project

 

To provide a guide (road map) for the programmer To illustrate the links among screens

 

To illustrate the functionality of the objects

 

Navigation schemes can be set up in a variety of ways, including sequential, topical

 

and exploratory.

 

1.               A sequential navigation scheme takes the user through a more or less controlled, linear process. Example are games with a story line that has a beginning, a middle, and an end; books that are repurposed as multimedia titles; slide show presentations; and instructional tutorials that require the student to move through the material step by step. This method often have buttons (Next, Forward, Continue, Previous, Back) or graphics (arrows, pointing fingers) as navigational aids.

 

2.               A topical navigation scheme allows the user to select from an array of choices or even search for specific information. Examples are multimedia encyclopedias, interactive shopping catalogs, and information kiosks, Topical navigation schemes have several layers. This requires special attention when designing the interface to make sure that users understand where they are and what they can do.

 

3.               An exploratory navigation scheme provides little structure or guidance. It relies on user interaction, usually the clicking of objects displayed on the screen. Many games, directed at both children and adults, use some form of exploratory navigation.

THE CREATING PHASE

 

At this point in the development process, the focus changes from planning to production, including creating the content and authoring the title.

STEP 7 : DEVELOPING THE CONTENT

 

“Creating the pieces”

 

The specifications, including any scripts, indicate the content to be incorporated into the multimedia title. There are numerous content issues that need to be address:

 

What is the level of quality for the content (photorealistic graphics, stereo sound)?

 

How will the content be generated (repurpose existing content, hire content experts to write text, employ graphic artist and other professionals)?

Who will be responsible for acquiring copyrights and licensing agreements? How will the content be archived and documented?

 

We learned about the elements that make up multimedia titles: text, sound, animation and video. We also learned the sources related to these elements; libraries of clipart, sound, and video, scanned photos and slides; draw and paint programs used to create graphics; video capture cards; MIDI synthesizers for music and word processing programs for text. If the goal is to market the title, quality is extremely important. Graphic artists and photographers would be contracted to create original artwork and pictures; actors would be employed for video production and narration; musicians might be hired to write and produce original music and sound effects; and editors would be used to review any text.

 

Multimedia title can contain hundreds of images, it is important to provide for cataloging the various graphical elements. Database of images would include the name, type and size of the images. This database would be used to keep track of the elements, determine total file size and provide reference for filenames that might be used in scripting.

STEP 8 : AUTHORING THE TITLE

 

“Bringing it all together”

 

In determining which authoring system to use, a developer would consider the following points:

 

The playback system – some authoring programs work with only one platform.

 

The emphasis placed on animation – certain programs have fairly sophisticated 2-D animation tools.

 

The expertise of the programmer – programs differ greatly in the approach they use (metaphor) and their scripting language.

 

Authoring a multimedia title can be as simple as creating slide show using presentation software such as Compel. You should select a background, type the text, scan some graphics and import clip art, video, and sound. You could even create buttons with hyperlinks. The entire process would be inexpensive, relatively quick to complete, and require little specialized expertise. These type of titles might be appropriate for the in-house training, lectures, conference presentations, sales presentations and other non-commercial applications.

 

In commercial applications, authoring plays significant role to provide functionality. Scripting is needed for such things, such as checking user input from the keyboard, accessing an external device (video disc); determining the configuration of the playback system and creating an installation program that is used to start the title.

THE TESTING PHASE

STEP 9 : TESTING THE TITLE

 

“Does it work the way it was planner?”

 

Although it is listed as the final step in the development process, testing should be ongoing. Testing can start at the beginning during the concept stage. Small groups of potential users could be shown a prototype of the proposed title to determine its feasibility. Conducting this “proof of concept” can provide valuable information that helps evolve the initial idea and prevent costly oversights.

 

Testing the design involves how the user interacts with the title and asks questions such as, Does the user understand the navigation scheme, terminology, icons, and metaphors? Does he or she get stuck, confused, or lost interest? Usability testing is a formal process in which potential users are videotaped as they interact with a little and asked to verbalize what they are thinking.

 

Testing the function of a multimedia title involves making sure it works according to the specifications and answers questions such as Does clicking on each button or object cause the appropriate action? Can animation, sound, and video clips be controlled by the user? Do graphics, text and other elements appear in the correct location.

 

The functionality can be tested with two process : alpha testing and beta testing. Alpha Testing is usually conducted in-house and is not restricted to the development team. The idea is to “try to make it crash”, and every conceivable action and navigation path should be explored.

 

Beta Testing is the final functional test before release. It involves selected potential users that could number in the thousands – Windows 95 had 40,000 be testers. Because the users are outside the company, they are often required to sign nondisclosure agreements to prevent them from revealing information about the title before it is released. Companies try to make it easy for beta testers to provide feedback by giving them an e-mail address to contact and /or disk containing a questionnaire that each tester fills out and returns in a prepaid package. To encourage a high level of participation, companies often provide an incentive such as discounts on the finished products. The goal of beta testing is to get feedback from variety of potential users and test done on as many different computer configurations as possible.