The End: Costs and Benefits of Giving the User More Control

In Chapter 11 on Graphics, the Web Style Guide, although geared mostly toward informational webpage designers, discusses how the internet and age of personal computers has allowed for greater use of multimedia and graphics. While there are more possibilities, images must be edited to meet the requirements of the internet; web formats include jpeg, gif, and png, and images need to be as condensed as possible to load efficiently; images can be reduced in size with an image editor to display at proper size at a resolution of 72 ppi (pixels per inch).

With those requirements met, the chapter authors argue, “we still have to answer the same questions communicators have always asked: What are the most effective uses of graphics, and what’s the best way to integrate words and images into an understandable story for the user?”

While an informational webpage might want to a picture in place of a thousand words, I wonder, is that appropriate for ELit? In my original story, I can try to convey long pauses and crying through words, but is it more appropriate for me to set the pace through the speed at which words appear and disappear and to show crying through animation?

In ELiterature in EPublishing, Susana Pajares Tosca discusses the characteristics of electronic literature (as opposed to e-books) in “Brave New Book: How to Recognize Electronic Literature When You See It. While many of the characteristics are the same as those cited by Hayles and other authors writing after 2002, one comment still seems to ring true today:

“Many online works take advantage of the language fusion. [Here the author mentions several works using Flash to integrate images, sound, and text.] The new hybrid literary works are neither totally textual nor absolutely cinematic, but make use of a mixture of both sets of interpretive conventions in a way that has yet to be analyzed.” (160)

Perhaps that is why so little is written on the subject of creating digital literature; while I can find texts about web design, gaming, video, etc., I find little to guide me in terms of what is "too much"...Of course, I just found this book, Digital storytelling: a creator's guide to interactive entertainment (by Carolyn Handler Miller), but even that seems to look at digital story telling more from a pragmatic purpose than any artistic or literary one.

So, while I am still looking for more information on the features, standards, and possibilities for digital literature, I think I finished my first attempt. The interactive Flash movie should be available at Nightmare.

A few reflections on the process and recommendations to anyone in the future...

Finalizing buttons: If you are creating menus to give the user more control, it is essential that your buttons jump to the proper frames. To this end, it is imperative that as you finish a section, you write down it's starting point. When I tested the final movie, I found that some of the buttons linked to the wrong frame. I would have spent may more hours debugging if I hadn't written down the points on the timeline for each section--this way I could edit the buttons and type in the correct frame number, rather than going back through the timeline at random trying to find the right place again.

Writing: Write visually. I suppose you could say this means writing like a playwright or a poet, but keep in mind the "stage" you are composing on as you write/revise. I know my planning and production would have gone far more smoothly if I had envisioned this as a performance during the initial composition.

To this end, I would have done more with visual mock-ups, which would have helped me find or set up photo/video shoots that might have added more interest to the piece, and also help me decide on the overall visual design for the piece.

Control: Decide up front how much control the user will get and how this will manifest. I know I would have liked to try different command options within the threads of the story (i.e. if the user puts the mouse over this, then...), but given my time constraints and the fact that I am still learning the ins and outs of actionscript, it could have meant 60 more hours of work to go back and retroactively update.

Final thoughts...