Dr. Jim Rowan
ITEC 2110

Any file that is open on a Mac
Pull
File down to
Print
In the lower left hand corner of the print window
Click
“PDF”
Then select
“Save as pdf”

• You can save (to later download)
– Text documents (.doc, .ppt, .pdf)
– Audio files (.au, .mpg)
– video files (.mov, .m4v, .avi)
– image files (.jpg, .png, .tiff)
• .jpg, .png will display, .tiff will not
• Some file formats will not upload
– .wmv is one that won’t
– .aiff is another

• You can display
– Text (just type into the edit window)
– image: image files (.jpg, .png)
– media: for downloads
• shortFormatHelp
– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Cheatsheet
• longerFormatHelp
– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:How_to_edit_a_page

• The telling of stories has existed as long as humans have been on earth.
• So… how do you tell a story?
• It depends on what media you are going to use…
– Is it spoken to a live audience around a campfire?
– Is it an audio recording that is played ?
– Is it written as text in a book or magazine?
– Is it captured in a painting ?
– Is it told using pictures in a photo album?
– Is it performed as a play on stage?
– Is it recorded on video and played back?
– Is it video that is streaming over the web?
– Is it captured in the form of a video game ?

The media you choose affects the way the story is told
• If you are using print ed text…
– you must describe things well
• If you are using still images …
– you have to tell it visually by setting the scene
• If you are doing Film or Video?
– you have moving images and sound ...
– does the sound emphasize the moving image…
– or does the image emphasize the sound?
• If you are designing a Video game?
– moving images accented with sound?

Consider if you had spent your life working with the
SCROLL… and you were asked to change to the
BOOK...
BOUND
HMMMmmmm...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQHX
-SjgQvQ

• Affordances … a term from ecological psychology borrowed by Don Norman
• different things afford different interaction
• handles to pull door open
• push plates to push door open
• door levers rotate to open
• door knobs… twist? hmmm… I hate fake door knobs!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affordance http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecological_psychology http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Norman

• The Scroll
– can’t stack scrolls like books
– can’t skip around except to beginning or end
– but… reading flows without the interruption of pages
• The Book
– you can stack them
– you can level a table leg with them!
– but… the reading is interrupted by page turns
– add a TOC & page numbers you can skip around
– with index & page #s you can go to a specific place

• Web-based media
– you can consume it in any order you like
– links take you to a place (and back!)
• does a book do this?
– each page is in only one place… one change changes everyone’s version
• Compare that to the Book
– doesn’t allow this kind of universal change
– doesn’t take you back (no back button)
– but you can stick a piece of paper or a finger in it to hold your place… or fold down the corner of the page
– you can take notes in the margins

• yes, it does make corrections immediately available to everyone…
• but no history is kept like you would have with book editions
• you go back to “the same place” and it’s different... were you mistaken or did it change?
• http://www.archive.org/index.php

• Did you read everything?
– A book is easy just read from front to back
– Hyperlinked web pages… no
• Web-based also affords searching
– You can Google it and find it!

• A book? Not so much..
– the Index will help… if the thing you are looking for is in the index
– Ever read a book and think... where did I see this before?
…and then reach for the search tool?
…and then you feel kinda foolish?

• It takes time for conventions concerning the usage of new media to be formed…
• Consider film...
– At first there was no sound
– then the sound was performed
– then recorded sound was played with the film
• But with time… film developed its own unique forms
Hitchcock told the story visually, long sweeping scenes
Tarrentino accents the violence with rapid, quick cuts

• At first the new form tries to act like the old form… to make the new stuff look more familiar
– With movies, Newsreels “copied” newspaper-like layouts
– With computers, the desktop metaphor “copied” the office desk
• Alan Kay, XEROX PARC
– “The best way to predict the future is to invent it”
– personal computer usage exploded
– before desktop metaphor C:/ is all you got & few people used personal computers

• We are just beginning to understand what the possibilities are...
• We are just beginning to understand how to best build new multimedia stuff
– A mix of animation and live action
• 300, Sin City, Christmas Carol, Avatar
• TV series 24 and the movie Phone Booth ?
– several scenes are played simultaneously

• We are interested in media forms found on and transmitted across the Internet, how they work and how to manipulate them
• We will build them as projects
– audio
– still images
• bitmapped
• vector graphics
– moving images
• video camera
• 3D animation

• Time-based
– Media that changes over time
• Film
• Video
• Audio
• Static media
– Media that doesn’t change over time
• Pages in a book
• Photos in an album
• Images on a webpage

• Scroll - linear
• Book – linear… broken, but linear
– Must turn the pages
– but… Table of Contents and Index allow some non-linearity
– encyclopedia and dictionaries are media that are meant to be used in a non-linear manner
• Film/Videotape - linear
• DVD – primarily linear
– Chapters allow some non-linearity

• Supported through computer-based media
– Takes the form of hypermedia
– Web pages
• links to other pages, other parts of pages
– Interactive video games
• you go to different parts of the game depending on your input

• Yes… and No
• Yes: Programs appear interactive, but only within the constraints placed on the interaction by the programmer and the interaction designer
– Myst looked like a real world but you only had a few choices you could make
• No: Improvisation (on the part of the user) can’t happen unless it is planned and provided for in advance by the interaction designer and the programmer

• H uman C omputer I nteraction (my field)
– Intermingling of computers, engineering, human perception, psychology, affordance and human performance
– Taught here as ITEC 4130
• Standard ways to interact with computer-based media have been developed…
– buttons
– sliders
– radio buttons
– check boxes
– pull-down menus
– pop-up menus

• In the ’90s the internet was seen as a source ...
– you go to the internet to “look something up”
– its use was seen to have an economic advantage…
• you only have to put stuff in one place and everybody can get to it
• Now it is a transmission medium
– streaming content: live radio
– streaming content: view tv shows online

• Media is changing
• Internet is changing
• Affecting us socially
– we send email to people who are in the same room
• Giving us new capabilities & ways to interact
– mosquito ring tones
• Challenging our views of legality
– it’s on the web, can I use it without permission?
• Challenging our view of appropriate behavior
– spam… for instance
• Media provides opportunities for new interactions and new ways to communicate
• This class is about media and how it works